Benny Ivey, a Jackson native who spent 11 years in prison on drug charges, devoted himself to keeping youth and adults off the path he was once on after his release and rehab in 2009. To accomplish that, he and other "credible messengers"—members of the Jackson community who were previously incarcerated—partnered with local organizations to establish the "Strong Arms of Jackson" initiative in 2018.

"Credible messengers are people who have left the life we were living before behind us and are now doing something with ourselves to prosper," Ivey says. "We want to steer both adults in prisons and youth in the juvenile justice system away from making those same decisions from our pasts in their lives, and help others coming out of prison do things like find jobs and create a sustainable life on their own."

Strong Arms of Jackson partners with local companies to help find employment for people with prior felonies on their records and works with health organizations such as the People's Advocacy Institute and the University of Mississippi Medical Center to provide drug addiction treatment and mental health services, all of which help to reduce recidivism rates, Ivey says.

The group also plans to work with young men ages 15 to 25 at the Henley Young Youth Detention Center as part of its Inside Outside Program. Strong Arms of Jackson will offer activities several times per week on subjects such as conflict resolution, drug addiction treatment, relationship building and mentoring. The group plans to hold these programs both inside the detention center itself and in its own building outside the center.

Currently, the ongoing COVID-19 crisis has halted most of the organization's usual activities, Ivey says. In the meantime, Strong Arms of Jackson has shifted its focus to delivering groceries, toiletries and other items to families in need, and will resume its youth programs after the state gives permission to do so.

"We've spent these past two years doing community planning meetings with other local organizations to plan out how to accomplish our goals," Ivey says. "Brainstorming is where it all begins. The answers to things like drugs and violence lie in gathering perspectives from the community, not in Congress or the police department. We want to attack the root problems that cause those things and create new peer groups among young people at the same time."

Ivey was born in Norfolk, Va., but his family moved to south Jackson while he was still a baby and he grew up there all his life. His parents, who were both drug addicts, moved to another part of the city roughly every three months, he says, and he never got to stay long in any one school.

"I was what I call a product of my environment," Ivey says. "My parents were addicts, I became one myself, and I eventually started going to prison for drug charges, getting out, doing more drugs and going back to prison again. That was how I was living, and I had expected to eventually die that way too."

Ivey first went to prison on crystal meth charges in 1998, when he was 21 years old. He was in and out of prison a total of five times over the next 11 years, until the state eventually offered him drug rehab in 2010, which he completed by 2012.

"One day around 2010 I spent most of two days sleeping, and when I woke up I saw the same familiar scenery I'd seen outside a cell window for 11 years, and it hit me that I was just existing and not living any kind of life," Ivey says. "My grandmother, Granny Ruth, used to bring me to church before she died and had instilled Christian beliefs in me, but I'd never lived that way because of the life I felt I'd been dealt. That day at the window, I fell to my knees and prayed, and to this day I feel like God got me off the streets at the right time."

While undergoing rehab, Ivey started handwriting a book on his life, which he had originally planned to title "A Product of my Environment" until he found out there was already a book by that title. The manuscript, which has reached 1,200 pages, hasn't been published yet, and Ivey is considering other titles such as "The Ivey Chronicles."

After getting out of prison for the last time in 2010, Ivey took a job with a Jackson plumbing company called Plumbing and Everything Else and later became a partner in the business in 2015. In March 2020, he opened his own private plumbing business called Benny Ivey Plumbing and More, in part so he could set his own work schedule and have more time to focus on Strong Arms of Jackson.

"Our philosophy in Strong Arms of Jackson is that just because you've done time, you don't have to become a slave to stigma against incarcerated people after coming home," Ivey says. "I came from what I call 'the pits' and lost my juvenile years to addiction, detention centers and prisons, but I've made something of myself, and if I can do it, anyone can."

Ivey and his wife, Kristina Ivey, live in Florence, Miss., and have been married for seven years. They have a 14-year-old daughter named Natalie Ivey.