A Lewiston ex-convict starts nonprofit to keep the mission of mentoring fellow prisoners going
Dec. 26—Sometimes a person’s life breaks down bad enough to land them in prison. Odds are good that soon that same person, with that still-broken life, will be dropped back into the world. This go-around they will be branded a felon, possibly a pariah, and most likely destitute.
The truth is that if newly released prisoners dare to dream of success, the job rejections may start to feel like taunts. “Normalcy” becomes something reserved for folks with bank accounts, driver’s licenses or clean criminal records.
A year ago, Jay Bright, 45, of Lewiston, was in that situation. Today, he’s been released early from probation and has started a nonprofit, called Upwelling. He formed the charity to give gym memberships to former prisoners returning to Lewiston, something Bright believes creates good health for the whole community.
“My hope is that everyone will remember that everybody’s got, you know, something to give somebody else, and that we’re all just trying to minimize suffering and enhance joy,” Bright said.
For convicted felons, that journey from suffering to joy is often blocked by drug addiction, mental illness, doubt or despair. Inside prison, strict routine may have kept self-destructive impulses at bay. On the outside, recovery groups help. People working the state probation and parole system help. But it’s often not enough.
Bright experienced success in life before falling far and hard. But he’s learning from it.
“It’s because of my education in the past, and my successes, I knew, fundamentally, the power of maintaining a rigid physical exercise routine,” Bright said. “I understood that first you have to take care of your body and mind in order to take care of anything else.”
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In late 2024, Bright was released from Mountain View Transformation Center in Kuna, Idaho, known as a “programming prison.” A bus brought him back to Lewiston and dropped him off with a small box containing his possessions and $24.
Idaho Department of Correction Probation and Parole workers helped Bright find a place to live and other necessities. But Bright wanted to continue his healthy workout habit, which he believes is a key part of his path to success. That healthy “distraction” fends off the bad impulses that come with addiction to drugs like meth, fentanyl or heroin.
Now, after a year spent helping others by leading local recovery groups, Bright wants to make Upwelling successful. He is working with his board of directors to raise $1,500 a month, which would meet the needs of Lewiston’s ex-prison population.
Jay Bright in prison
Jay Bright is dynamic, the sort of person that American society tends to reward. He’s youthful, even though hard experience has etched itself into the skin around his eyes. He contemplates life’s bigger questions and he is eager to hear what others think the answers might be. His natural charisma mixed with humility makes him someone people root for.
At 4:45 a.m., the day Bright was released from Mountain View, a crowd of correction workers and law enforcement folks gathered at the exit gate to wish him well. Bright didn’t know it at the time but a sendoff like that for a prisoner is rare.
“The man who runs the St Vincent (de Paul) program down there, he was like, ‘That’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever seen,'” Bright said, good-humoredly. “But my judge, when they released me, they write a review, and my judge said that he had received notification from administration at that prison that I had made a lasting positive impact on both the residents and staff. And my judge said that was pretty weird, too.”
While inside, Bright was trusted enough to have access to every part of the 442-bed prison at any time, except during lockdowns. He was well-regarded for his work mentoring other prisoners and leading groups designed to aid their reentry into the world.
In 2023, Bright also helped prisoners’ children have merry Christmases.
“Because they’re in prison, they can’t get their children gifts,” Bright said. Angel Tree, a program through the Salvation Army, allows inmates to register their kids or nieces and nephews to get gifts and a personalized note.
But prisoners don’t trust people and they don’t give personal information to strangers.
“I had earned a degree of trust inside with that population then, so I was able to really recruit a lot of people for that. And I think a lot of children had a Christmas because I personally had a large hand in making sure that people signed up for that,” Bright said.
That’s not a brag. Rather, it’s someone whose life collapsed under the weight of drug use and despair who is trying to explain, with both amusement and amazement, that he has discovered he has a gift for helping others.
Jay Bright before prison
Drug addiction has long been an issue for Bright, even when he was successful.
When he was younger, Bright worked to pay for college, dropping out 21 credits shy of a degree in creative writing from Boise State University. He worked construction and became a Treasure Valley homeowner. He was married and had two daughters.
Bright’s fall was swift and hard.
In 2021, Bright’s wife, who was his “love,” and his oldest daughter, drove to visit family in Montana. On their way there, their vehicle collided with a semi-truck, killing them both. Shortly afterward, he surrendered fully to drug addiction and became estranged from his youngest daughter.
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For the next couple years, he worked off and on, did some court-ordered drug recovery treatment, and descended into homelessness in Spokane. He also did a short stint at the Washington State Corrections Center in Shelton, near Seattle, for a burglary conviction.
In July 2022, Bright received a suspended two- to four-year prison sentence for burglary, a felony, in Nez Perce County’s 2nd District Court. Probation violations convinced Judge Mark Monson to send Bright to Mountain View for a year, to receive programming and a chance to avoid a full prison sentence.
“I’ve just been programmed and been down for like five years, on and off for five years,” Bright said.
Becoming citizen Jay Bright again
Bright’s been sober for two years, out of prison for one, and is creating a life that helps others. His rocky experience has positioned him to help others like him. He wants to share what he is learning by going from “hyper-successful to being the biggest loser on the planet.”
Bright said he made his own decision to become homeless, but that doesn’t make the experience less awful.
“And immersing myself into this homeless culture that’s just hell — to see the despair and despondency and just the hopelessness — and then to kind of be moving into this direction … it’s the weirdest thing,” he said.
Like so many newly released felons, Bright had no possessions. Unlike many others, though, he had a skilled trade. So he was fortunate to find a boss, Jacob Mast of Truway Home Improvement in Lewiston, willing to give him a job with a livable wage.
Bright believes his ability to persevere, to remain focused on his goals, was aided early on by maintaining the fitness regime he’d stuck to in prison.
About 70 percent of the prison population works out, he said. So when the bus drops you and leaves you without that self-improvement daily ritual, your physical and mental health can suffer.
“It sort of feels like you’re left treading water,” Bright said.
Starting Upwelling is Bright’s way of shifting the odds for others who have fallen in over their heads and creating some solid footing for them to stand on.
Ferguson can be reached at dferguson@lmtribune.com.
Upwelling
A nonprofit started by Jay Bright and registered with Idaho in July, helping former prisoners reenter the Lewiston community by providing gym memberships.
He needs: $1,500 a month
His events: Conversation with a Convict
Date: Planning for February
His goal: fundraising
Board of Directors:
Jacob Mast, owner of Truway Home Impovement
Summer Overburg, Idaho Dept. of Correction Probation and Parole District manager
Jason (Jay) Bright, founder
His contact information:
upwellinglewiston@gmail.com
(509) 401-0059
