PRIDE

Pittsburgh Outpatient Office PRIDE Program is "adopted" by NOBLE for the Holidays!!!!

The PRIDE (Program for the Re-Integration, Development and Empowerment of exploited individuals) program is a court ordered program run out of the Pittsburgh Outpatient office that works with individuals who have been convicted of a prostitution charge who are then sentenced to one year of probation and to the PRIDE Program. PRIDE addresses recovery from the lifestyle of prostitution and exploitation from an innovative post-traumatic stress model. Individuals sentenced to PRIDE participate in weekly post-traumatic stress psycho-educational groups where they gain knowledge and support from sharing previous life experiences around the violence and exploitation associated with their often many years of work in the sex industry. Participants also must complete a drug and alcohol evaluation and are required to successfully complete any recommended level of care. They also have access to our psychiatrist for their often neglected mental health needs and to our 24-hour a day emergency hotline with direct access to the PRIDE therapist for support. Additionally, participants receive intensive case management and learn the life skills necessary for re-integration back into a lifestyle free of sexual violence and exploitation.

The PRIDE Program is happy to announce that we have been "adopted" by NOBLE (National Organization of Black Law Enforcement Executives, Pittsburgh Branch) for the 2005 Holiday season. NOBLE has provided the PRIDE Program with funding to have a Holiday lunch for the participants at a popular local restaurant. Additionally, NOBLE is sponsoring an "Angel Tree" for the PRIDE Program. All program participants and their children will have an angel on the tree with their "holiday wish list" for gifts. NOBLE members will select an angel or two and provide some of the items on the wish lists and return them to the Pittsburgh Outpatient office for distribution to the PRIDE participants. Many of the PRIDE participants have painful memories of previous holiday seasons, and for most of them, this will be the first holiday season in many years that they have not working the street; and thanks to the generosity of the members of NOBLE, they will feel the "Spirit of the Holidays"!!!!