In downtown Shelbyville.

Located in central Indiana.

Tucked away on the square, there's a place that doesn't quite look like what you'd expect from a charity.

This is the Rupert's Kids Arcade 2.0 Pinball machines, arcade cabinets, and graphic posters line the walls, but none of it belongs to Rupert Boneham, And that's exactly the point.

All of these machines are owned by other men and women here in the community, other fellow Hoosiers.

That want to give back.

None of these machines are ours!

It started by the community getting together saying “well, this is what we should do.” *Celebrating* But it's not all fun and games.

The arcade is just one piece of something much bigger.

Rupert's Kids is a reentry program.

30 years in the making built on a simple idea that people deserve a second chance.

So what Rupert's Kids is, is a 12 bed reentry program right now our program has been up and running since the early 90s, and now instead of just working with juveniles, we work with adults to coming out of the detention centers and off the streets teaching them how to make that legal living.

how to have that sense of self-worth and work ethic, how to go out there and, you know, enjoy life.

And they do it entirely on their own.

All without any city, state, federal funding, without any grant dollars, The man behind the program isn't your typical social worker.

Before Rupert's kids took off, he was a contestant on one of the most watched reality shows in television history, and one I myself grew up watching.

Survivor.

Now I've played four times, but I won All America's Tribal Council after season eight, they had 38 million votes in 72 hours.

I got 87% of the vote and won a million dollars for losing the game twice.

It was wonderful.

What would you do if you had a million dollars?

It's a question many of us are asked as kids, and one that Rupert knew the answer to... Even before his victory.

When I won the million dollars, I spent it in three weeks getting myself and my family out of debt, making sure my mother, my family, my world was set.

What was left?

He gave away.

I ended up letting my wife and my daughter and myself all pick different charities.

I picked the children, my wife picked the elderly, and my daughter picked the animals.

But the money wasn't the only thing Survivor gave him.

so many people that we would battle before Survivor that wouldn't want to give you a second chance.

After Survivor, they would look at me and say, oh my gosh, if you believe they get another.

If Rupert believes they deserve another chance, we should give them another chance.

That second chance, takes shape inside a donated building just a few miles away from the arcade, they call “The WhereHouse” because it's where recovery happens.

We knew back 20 years ago when we were running our work crew and our mentoring program, that you had to have someplace safe for young men and women to go.

At the end of the day, The program runs on individual plans.

You'll find no one size fits all approaches here.

There are a thousand different ways of getting away from the booze and drugs.

it's not to us to pick what's the right way and what's the wrong way for you.

It's to you to show us what you want and we use our peer recovery coaches and our mentors to help guide you in making positive choices, We've created a space where you can get assistance paying your rent.

having food.

We've worked it so that you can even pay for your services by work so you can save your money.

To get first and last and deposit rent to maybe get that first house, maybe buy that first house.

We've got one young man there he's getting ready to move out, but he's actually got a realtor and he's looking at properties!

And the arcade is all part of that goal.

We have used the arcade for years to be some of the community's first jobs.

This has been that reentry job for learning how to deal with the public again.

And as we are dealing with coming out of the system, getting away from our addictions, showing that we are doing better, we want to get back with our families.

We need places like this where we can have multi generations playing together and teaching our parents how to interact and and play with their kids again, From the warehouse to the arcade.

Rupert's Kids provides a safe space for those who are barely surviving and reminds them the best is yet to come.

It's a self-generating empowerment program.

All our best mentors are men and women that we raised in our program.

You gotta be able to go to work, pay your bills, take care of yourself.

And like I did out on Survivor, you know?

Enjoy life.

Know that it is not just your island and your game and know that it is... It is all of our game.

It's all of our adventure.

It is our game to win.

*Cheering* For more Across Indiana stories, go to WFYI.org/AcrossIndiana.