What is PYHIT?

By KATE BLAIN- | Comments: 0 | Leave a comment

According to PYHIT founder Rev. Peter Young, 80 percent of ex-convicts are released from prison still struggling with addictions to alcohol and drugs. Most also have few job or even basic living skills to make the transition back into society.

PYHIT was created to provide what Father Young calls a "glidepath" to recovery: Just as a glidepath provides direction for a pilot landing a plane on an aircraft carrier, PYHIT provides a "three-legged stool" of addiction treatment, housing and employment.

People who enter the program participate in counseling, addiction-recovery programs and vocational training. In exchange, PYHIT rents them low-cost apartments while they get back on their feet and helps them find employment, mainly in the hotel and food-service industries.

On a $15 million-a-year budget, PYHIT operates:

* two full-service motels, the Schuyler Inn in Menands and LeMoyne Manor in Syracuse;

* seven cafeterias, a coffee shop, and several fried-chicken and other restaurants;

* two floral boutiques; and

* a convenience store in a local housing complex for seniors.

In addition, PYHIT runs shelters and transitional housing. A study by The University at Albany's school of criminal justice revealed that the program has a success rate of at least 80 percent and as high as 92 percent in terms of participants' not being reincarcerated.

Malik is one alumnus of the program. For 15 years, he told The Evangelist, he used his job as a fashion designer traveling around the world to feed his drug addiction.

When he entered the PYHIT program, Father Young remembered that "he would come in here on Monday morning and say, `I do NOT want to be here!'"

Today, Malik jokes about how Father Young must have wanted to crawl under his desk and hide when he saw Malik coming. Now, Malik is in recovery and plans a career in human services, helping others fight what Father Young calls "the monster of addiction."

"Father Young told me, `It's a process,'" Malik noted. "It is -- and it works."

(Editor's note: Family Rosary/Family Theater Productions recently produced a documentary outlining Father Young's program and philosophy. "Glidepath to Recovery" will be shown on some PBS stations in the fall. To order a copy of the video, call 1-800-299-7729.)(KB)

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