By The Numbers

Dual Metrics of Success

Project Return works. And we have the numbers to prove it!

We have been flipping the norm year after year in Tennessee.

The hallmarks of our services are high employment and low recidivism.

While the state and national recidivism rates exceed 50%, the rate for people coming through Project Return is lower than 15%.

Recidivism Rate

Project Return
15%
State & National Average
50%

83%

Employment Rate

Handshake Icon

578

Jobs in 2019

Employment Rate

A job is the key that opens the door to a new life. Over 80% of our participants succeed in getting employment. In fact, of 694 people who started with Project Return in 2019, 578 got jobs. This is the opposite of the norm, in which up to 70% of people are unemployed for their first year after incarceration.

Value Created

Project Return saves taxpayer dollars by helping to prevent people from recidivating.

Comparing Project Return’s lower recidivism to the higher rate of the state overall, and considering just the cost of imprisonment, Project Return saved $6.3M taxpayer dollars in 2019.

$6,257,104

Taxpayer Dollars Saved in 2019

“All through my life I’ve never felt appreciated;
not even by me. Project Return made me feel
accepted, loved, and appreciated.”
– John