Jodi Hocking is the Founder/Organizer of Return Strong. She has spent almost a decade of her career organizing new unions across the country- most notably supporting low income workers in their fight for a living wage in the state of NY. When her partner was incarcerated after a parole violation she was infuriated at the lack of justice in what she had thought was a “justice system.” She realized that she could use her professional skills to organize other people who were impacted by the criminal legal system in Nevada to fight for change; that decision has forever changed her life, and was the birth of Return Strong.

Her hope for Return Strong was to build effective reentry programs for impacted people in Nevada and to expand communities’ perception of incarcerated people beyond “guilt and innocence.” She knew doing something was better than doing nothing- and began organizing impacted families to advocate for change within the Nevada DOC. After successfully building a collective of families, Jodi was quickly able to begin learning about the injustices within NDOC from incarcerated people themselves, revolutionizing their accessibility to self-advocate. While it began as being a “voice to the voiceless,” she now has had the honor of creating space and avenues for people impacted by the criminal legal and penal systems to empower the use of their own voice for change. And people are listening. Jodi now spends her time as an activist alongside formerly incarcerated and incarcerated people and their families, using an equity lens to build true justice for the most marginalized and vulnerable populations within Nevada’s prison system.