New app aims to make it easier for people leaving incarceration to identify resources

By Rachel Crumpler

For someone leaving a prison or jail, there are countless questions to answer: about health care, housing, work and relationships. Finding the right support is often difficult, especially when resources are scattered. 

An app released last week seeks to fill a gap in guidance for the recently incarcerated. 

Next Steps by RREPS uses artificial intelligence to create personalized reentry plans in just a few minutes by pulling from a verified database of resources maintained by RREPS. 

The app was developed by the nonprofit Recidivism Reduction Educational Program Services, led by Kerwin Pittman. Since his release from prison in 2018 after 11 years behind bars, Pittman’s North Star has been making it easier for people leaving incarceration to find the support they need to rebuild their lives. 

Pittman said the app had been in development for more than a year. Users, including formerly incarcerated people, family members and service providers, can download the free Next Steps app on their smartphones or use it from a computer browser. It’s designed to help people leaving incarceration identify housing, health care and other resources tailored to their needs — quickly.  

After entering things like their location, needs and circumstances, users get a personalized reentry plan with recommended resources and step-by-step guidance. The plan can be printed or exported as a PDF to read outside the app or share with someone.

“​​Reentry should never be a maze that someone has to navigate on their own,” Pittman said at an event in Raleigh launching the app. The May 28 event was attended by community stakeholders, prison officials, service providers and justice-impacted individuals. “Reentry should be a bridge that somebody should always walk across.”

The app builds on several other initiatives Pittman has launched in recent years aimed at breaking cycles of incarceration.

In 2024, he launched the Recidivism Reduction Call Center, a hotline — staffed by people who have experienced incarceration and who are also certified community health workers — that connects callers to resources across North Carolina to help them reenter their communities. Hotline operators draw from a database of more than 800 resources, from housing options to “second chance” employers to mental health professionals.

In 2025, Pittman unveiled another initiative: Mobile Recidivism Reduction Centers. The first center was created by converting an “old and dusty” bus into a mobile support hub that takes reentry services directly to people in need. A second bus got on the road in August. Together, the mobile centers reached more than 13,000 people in 2025 — in just two regions of the state, Pittman said. 

Pittman is also working to transform a shuttered prison in Wayne County into a reentry and workforce development campus to support hundreds of formerly incarcerated men. 

Pittman said it’s important to keep innovating and to offer reentry support in more than one way, because no single approach is right for everyone. The app, he said, is intended to complement — not replace — the organization’s other programs and other reentry work being done across the state.

“Today is about unveiling a new way forward, a way forward where people don’t have to come home lost, a way forward where families do not have to continue to search in the dark to find help, a way forward where service providers can have better tools to work with,” Pittman said. “This is the future of reentry.”

A new approach to reentry

The launch of the Next Steps app comes as North Carolina officials are more and more focused on boosting reentry support for the roughly 18,000 people who leave state prisons every year, along with thousands more leaving county jails. 

Many people leave prison without a place to stay, a job or access to needed health care — challenges that can quickly derail their transition. Without a clear plan or knowledge of resources to turn to, many people struggle to reestablish a life in the community, which can fuel cycles of recidivism and reincarceration. 

An April 2026 report released by the North Carolina Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission found that from a sample of nearly 12,000 people released from North Carolina state prisons in fiscal year 2023, 41 percent were re-arrested within two years, and 37 percent were sent back to prison — at a high cost to taxpayers. Housing one person in a North Carolina prison costs more than $54,000 per year. 

In January 2023, North Carolina joined Reentry 2030, a national initiative aimed at reducing recidivism by 30 percent by 2030. Since then, state leaders — including first lady Anna Stein — have focused on reducing barriers for people leaving incarceration.

Pittman said that conversations around second chance housing, second chance employment and workforce development programming have increased in recent years, but many systems are still fragmented, and providers often rely on outdated information. 

Though reentry services have expanded, Pittman said people still struggle with the first step: identifying which resources are relevant to their needs and are available upon release. With the app, he saw an opportunity to leverage technology to help fill this gap.

Pittman described the app as “a reentry navigation system” designed to help people connect to resources more efficiently, not replace providers, case workers, peer support specialists and others working with formerly incarcerated people.

Kenyatta Leal, who spent 19 years incarcerated and is now executive director of Next Chapter, an organization creating career pathways in the tech industry for formerly incarcerated people, traveled from California to attend the unveiling of the Next Steps app. He has also leaned into harnessing technology to make reentry support more accessible and responsive to individual needs. He developed an AI chatbot called REGGIE, which similarly uses AI to identify and provide personalized reentry support in all 50 states.

“It’s very accessible for people who are coming home, and I think that we’re going to see more and more technology like this coming from people with lived experience,” Leal said.

“It’s these steps that we’re taking into the future that are really going to open up more doors, more opportunities and, let’s face it, more hope for people who are coming home,” he added.

Pittman said he has discussed the Next Steps app with N.C. Department of Adult Correction Secretary Leslie Cooley Dismukes and is exploring whether the app could eventually be used by prison case managers and by incarcerated people preparing for release. 

“The goal ultimately is to be able to have these tools accessible for case management inside of an institution, so it’ll be an easier lift, especially with the staffing shortage,” Pittman said. He noted that some case managers are currently pulled to work security posts because of chronic correctional officer staff shortages at the Department of Adult Correction. “They can just click the button to enter some information in and just pull up to date resources for these individuals to help them go on their own journey.”

The Next Steps app will be updated based on user feedback, said Sarvesh Pandiarajan, a NC State University student who helped develop it.

“Our goal here is simple: make reentry support more organized, tailored and effective to each situation, so people have a stronger foundation as they transition back into their communities,” Pandiarajan said.

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