Recent graduates of The Streets Don't Love You Back intervention program. Submitted photo

The Streets Don’t Love You Back, an intervention program and movement to keep youth away from the street life, is starting its next five-week session on May 23.

Founded by Robert and Lucinda Boyd, TSDLYB offers guidance for those trying to get out of “the life” or who might be at risk.

“It’s for anybody that wants to get their life together,” Rob Boyd said.

Boyd runs a program in Maricopa and two more in Phoenix. TSDLYB is in 150 prisons and jails.

It educates youth about gangs, drugs, crime and other dangers of the street life. And then it gives them resources for finding another path.

The free course, one-hour sessions for five Mondays at the municipal court, will discuss decision-making, anger management, conflict resolution and problem solving. Taught by Rob Boyd, it will get into substance abuse, attitude and self-respect.

At the end of the course, participants can keep the workbook and receive a certificate.

But Boyd said the certificate is just a piece of paper. What’s important is what happens next.

He sees success in the past participants who stay in touch and even call him for advice. He sees it in those who return as guest speakers. He has seen ex-gangsters come through the program and children as young as 9.

The pull of the program is, as board member Marc Montgomery called it, “the story of Rob.”

Boyd wrote “The Streets Don’t Love You Back” about his own life of crime on the streets of Detroit and how he eventually pulled himself out of the lifestyle. Boyd is the son of a pastor from whom he was estranged. When he was 9, he watched his grandfather kill his stepfather. At 10, he was already living the street life.

As an adult he was a drug boss and no stranger to cell bars. He lost friends to prison and the grave. He was featured on the “Best Friends Gang” episode of the Reelz Channel’s “Gangsters: America’s Most Evil.”

He credits Lucinda, a registered nurse, with turning all of that around.

“She’s the reason I totally changed my life over from the streets,” he said.

He also credits her with organizing the movement and the intervention program. They met in April 2009. A month later, they had started the TSDLYB movement. That June they started a radio show and the following August he wrote the book version of TSDLYB. They married in December 2009.

Through television and radio shows, they share stories of those who survived the streets and made positive changes for themselves.

The resources created by TSDLYB are designed to keep youth off the streets and help convicts “re-acclimate into society or live a better life behind prison walls,” Montgomery said.

Boyd took on domestic violence issues with his second book, “Never Hit a Woman.”

Boyd is also a recording artist with 10 albums. He will soon release the soundtrack to his new documentary “The Sons of a Preacher.” That chronicles how he discovered his father’s hypocrisy and secrets after his 2011 death. Boyd found out he had 11 half-siblings from other women. Four of those brothers were in prison at the time.

Check out the music video

It was exactly the horrific situation he wanted to keep young men and women away from. Boyd turned that anger and confusion into the song “The Sons of a Preacher,” gospel hip-hop co-written with Calvin Jak Winfield with an accompanying video.

Montgomery, who edited the video, called it “the best gospel song I ever heard.”

TSDLYB has a string of programs to direct youth to channel their energy into something positive, like a boxing club or the Goof100 Skateboard Club, and to give support and resources for adults.

Community of Hope has been a primary driver of the intervention program, which has also received encouragement from state Sen. Catherine Miranda, Mayor Christian Price, Maricopa Police Chief Steve Stahl and Justice of the Peace Lyle Riggs.

For information on sponsoring the intervention program, visit TheStreetsDontLoveYouBack.ning.com.