In the business of changing lives
He went from Texas Stadium to the business world and now to a deserted parking lot to help make a difference
Joey Mickey is in the business of changing lives

Lined up in the parking lot near 4th and Hudson, the group was such a sight that even the bums stared.

Some folks wore workout clothes. Running shoes. Sweatshirts. Shorts for a brave few on a brisk January morning. One gal even carried an iPod.

There were others, though, in baggy jeans and clunky boots. One guy even puffed on a cigarette.

The man in the black sweatshirt and grey sweatpants towered over all of them.

"C'mon,” he said. "Stretch it on out.”

He started with neck rolls, then switched to shoulder and hips and knees and ankles.

Joey Mickey was a star at Millwood High and a standout at Oklahoma. He even played for a short time in the NFL, his rookie year with Dallas coming the season that the Cowboys won the second of back-to-back Super Bowls under Jimmy Johnson.

He's gone from Owen Field and Texas Stadium to a deserted downtown parking lot.

And has never been happier.

He is the founder of the New Alternatives Center, a place where young people are getting their lives on track. All have been assigned to the program by the courts. Most have deferred or suspended sentences, and many are dealing with drug or alcohol offenses, not to mention addictions.

The program has been so successful that several judges are pushing Mickey to open a residential treatment center.

Ever wonder why sports matter?

Joey Mickey is using the lesson he learned in sports even though than a decade has passed since his playing days ended.

"That's what I turn back to every day with these kids — what did I learn in sports?” he said. "It taught me teamwork, how to fail, how to fall on my face and get back up. You still have 30 more plays to finish out the game. You can't just give up.”

Those lessons forged a philosophy. New Alternatives is a team, and Mickey is the coach. Discipline? Encouragement? A ride to the center? A meeting in his office? He'll do whatever it takes to get the best out of everyone.

Thing is, Mickey requires the same level of commitment, including a mandatory run every Saturday at 8 a.m.

Before, they ran the streets and found trouble.

Now, they follow a man trying to change their path.

"To do this on a day-in, day-out basis is not glamorous,” Oklahoma County District Judge Twyla Mason Gray said. "It's plain old hard work. I am so grateful that there are people that will dedicate their lives to turning other people's lives around.”

Selected in the seventh round of the 1993 NFL Draft, Mickey landed with the Dallas Cowboys but always had designs on returning to Oklahoma City. It was home. It was the place he wanted to put down roots, open a business, make his life.

Mickey got his insurance license in 1997 while his wife opened a bail bonds agency.

Business was good for both.

But after a few years, the bail bonds business was going so well that Mickey sold his insurance agency and went to work with his wife. He quickly found himself offering more than dollars and cents. He provided common sense, too.

Mickey would tell folks how to dress when they appeared in court, how to talk to the judge, how to present themselves well.

"The business just really picked up,” Mickey said. "I guess they felt that we cared about them more.”

Simple gestures made such a profound impact.

Why not do more?

Mickey approached Oklahoma County District Judge Ray Elliott with an idea. He wanted to open a facility that offered counseling for substance abuse and domestic abuse as well as life skills classes such as money management and job assistance, but he wanted to put his own twist on the program.

"Go for it,” the judge told him.

Mickey started hiring staff, including certified counselors. The state granted certification in 2004.

New Alternatives Center was born.

Kennith Fennel used to run. As an 18-year-old, he was found guilty on drug and weapons charges and sentenced to Regimented Inmate Discipline, a bootcamp-style program used mainly with young offenders.

Fennel fled instead of fulfilling his sentence.

Finally at the age of 34, he turned himself in. He spent a year in RID, was paroled in 2006 and assigned to New Alternatives.

"Thank God they put me in that program,” Fennel said.

Like everyone who comes through the doors, New Alternatives gave Fennel a battery of tests to pinpoint where he needed help. He was a long-time drug user, so he had to do a weekly drug test. He had no driver's license and no financial credit, important tools in getting and keeping a job, so Mickey showed him how to get both.

Now, Fennel owns a home and a painting business, Fennel Fine Finishes.

"His program, I know it's going to sound sappy, but it's changed my life,” he said. "I didn't have nothing and was nothing. They changed everything about me. They taught me how to be better.”

He credits not only the program but also the people.

A father of four, Fennel couldn't always get a babysitter. He could bring them with him to New Alternatives. Or if he couldn't get anyone to pick them up, someone from the center would do it.

Even something as simple as calling him by name was a big deal.

"Most places, you're just a client or a parolee or you're addressed as defendant,” Fennel said. "They treated me like a human.”

And he knows that if need be, Mickey would be there for him even though Fennel has been out of the program for several months.

"Mickey's committed,” Fennel said. "He believes in this.”

The man had no driver's license, but he never missed a Saturday morning run. He rode his bike all the way from Midwest City to downtown Oklahoma City every week.

"Joey got this kid believing in himself,” the judge said.

The young man earned his high school diploma.

"These are the differences that guy is making,” Bass said of Mickey. "Joey Mickey humbles all of us with his commitment to these kids.” By all of us, Bass didn't just mean judges.

"If we were all cut from that cloth, we'd all be better off. It's the butterfly effect, you know? He's over here flapping his wings in Oklahoma City, Okla., and he's causing a typhoon on the other side of the world.”

Change happens with slow, sometimes small steps.

There are steps back, too.

"What we know about addiction is relapse is the rule, not the exception,” Twyla Mason Gray, the district judge, said. "You're not going to be able to correct in six months what's taken 20 years to get there.”

Overcoming mistakes. Staying in the game. Forging ahead.

Those are lessons Mickey learned through sports. They were taught at Millwood, OU and Dallas. Even though Mickey has no formalized education in counseling — his certified staffers fulfill that need — he knows all about motivating.

"People fail every day,” Mickey said. "It's just like making a bonehead play on the football field. You know you have to go sit in meetings and watch film and get ridiculed ... but still, you have to find the desire to get out there the next day and do a better job.”

And like the men who coached him — Leodies Robinson at Millwood, Gary Gibbs and Bobby Proctor at OU, Jimmy Johnson in Dallas — Mickey has to figure out what motivates each of the young adults sent to New Alternatives. That isn't always easy. It requires time and dedication to develop relationships with the hundreds of people who are in the program at any one time.

The payoff is in the people who leave the program changed. The one-time gang member who is having his tattoos removed. The former athlete who is back in sports after using drugs. The young man who now wants to be a Marine.

Mickey found what makes them tick.

Ironic that along the way, he discovered that this is what makes him tick.

"It's God-sent, I guess,” he said. "It's just something I enjoy doing.”

Mickey, still looking much like he did during his playing days, gathered the group around him. The men and women looked at him like a little league team peering up at its coach.

People told Mickey that his methods wouldn't work, that he had to pound change into the heads of these young people by yelling and cussing at them.

"It's always good to see y'all,” he said. "Out of trouble. Not goin' back to jail.”

Heads nodded.

"Y'all know I love ya, right?”

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