Kelli ElliottKelli Elliott was released from Coffee Creek Correctional Facility for women in March. She had heard about PHOENIX from a friend inside and contacted us very soon after her release. She is 26 years old and has four children. After her time at Coffee Creek she decided that she needed to make a serious change of direction in order to be a good mom to her kids. She signed up for the PHOENIX Mentor Project. She came to as many meetings as she could – though she was required to go through a substance abuse program at the same time. Still, she jumped into PHOENIX with both feet, speaking at a class at Portland State within a month of her release.

All summer she was in a deep struggle to regain custody of her children – a struggle she won - quite an accomplishment for a formerly addicted gang member and prisoner. She told her story before 1,000 people at Hands Across the Bridge, a celebration of recovery from addiction. She graduated from her substance abuse program with flying colors. At about the same time, she completed the Metropolitan Alliance for Common Good’s Leadership Institutes for Public Life – the training that she wasn’t able to take while in prison.

Kelli wants to help kids stay out of the trouble she got into as a teenager and young woman. She plans to become a PHOENIX mentor after completing her year as a mentee. Learning leadership skills and telling her story, along with the support she gets from PHOENIX, moves her closer to that dream every day.