Ben Owen on Turning a Dope House into a Hope House in Memphis

A little over a year ago, we set off on a mission that's had much farther reaching impact than we ever intended. We acquired a couple dope houses, boarded them up, and decided to turn them into safe houses to provide sober living to families trying to navigate early recovery. Places where parents can be reunited with kids addiction or trafficking had separated them from.

Today, the first of those former "trap houses" is complete!!!

We set out to renovate some homes, but we've seen LIVES restored in the process of rebuilding those homes.

Bubba Cox led the crew in the early days - today he is IN COLLEGE. COLLEGE. That's INSANE. Once he graduates, Bubba will be taking our mission to new levels and leading an intensive outpatient program we're starting. Bubba was there the day I was kicked out of Rebos in 2014 and our bond and brotherhood continues to morph into new and amazing things.

Chris Bobbitt was on his way to getting kicked off of drug court and sent back to prison when he went to work on the block. Today, he overseas ALL of our renovation operations and is a drug court graduate.

More than that, he's become a mentor to me on the RIGHT way to do these construction operations and has become one of the best friends l've ever had.

Josh Snead, fresh out of jail and rehab, asked me to put him to work a year ago. With less than 45 days of sobriety, he made the decision to go "all in" and made our purpose his own. Today, he's over a year clean and just recently took the lead role on helping a trafficking survivor escape a domestic violence situation, get clean, and find somewhere safe to go with her daughter - he's literally case managing a recovery operation. Like Chris and Bubba, Josh is truly one of the best friends I've ever had.

My brother in all things, Robert Coleman has taken over the day-to-day operations of BlackRifle so I can maintain the level of siloed focus needed to keep these most-important operations running. His wife has quit her job to assist with our non-profit operation and they're moving their family back to the south so they can be more hands-on with these missions.

Matt Wallace has rocketed from a resident of sober living to now running all men's recovery housing, liaising between us and our allies in the courts, and has become one of my closest confidants.

Tiffany, the sister I never had growing up, has moved from sober living to a house out there on the block - a place of her own - where she's able to oversee not only the work on that street, but all of our women's operations. She was there with me the day I first went back to my old block and decided to do what we're doing, and we wouldn't be doing any of it without her.

Cresia - if I'm being honest, one of the biggest reasons we even set off on this quest - has gone from living in one of those trap houses in active addiction to over a year clean and running a safe house providing sober living to women with small kids - she was there for our rock bottom and we were honored to be there for hers, sometimes it's better to help a person change than it is to simply "change your people, places and things". We couldn't do any of what we do in South Memphis without my sister from another mister.

The list of names who were at one point a beneficiary of our services who have come alongside this mission has gotten too long to attempt to shout out in this post. I've lost count of the number of lives saved and impacted, but it's staggering.

Watch this video, and stay tuned because some big things are coming.