​Bridges To Life

Tommy Lyles

Units:  Ellis, Estelle, Ferguson, Goree, Polunsky, Wainwright

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A retired minister and former TDCJ* Chaplain, Tommy has joined BTL as our new Huntsville Area Regional Coordinator.

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Along with serving as a United Methodist Minister for over 40 years, Tommy began volunteering 20 years ago with Kairos Prison Ministry. Through Kairos, he felt God's direction to go into full-time prison ministry and in 2013 became the Chaplain at the Eastham Unit. In 2017, he was asked to take on the role of Region 1 Director

of Chaplaincy for TDCJ, supervising 18 chaplains on 14 units.

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Tommy's involvement with Bridges To Life began while serving as Chaplain at the Eastham Unit, where his wife Debbie volunteered for BTL. He soon joined her as a program facilitator, and both have donated hundreds of hours of volunteer service. Though retired from his TDCJ Chaplaincy role since May 2020, Tommy intends to continue "driving Miss Debbie" to the Eastham Unit so she can keep facilitating 

the BTL program while he serves as BTL's newest Regional Coordinator.

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Tommy and Debbie have been married over 41 years and live out in the country between Huntsville and Midway with their three Labrador Retrievers, deer, wild hogs and other assorted critters. They have three adult children and two grandchildren.

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*Texas Department of Criminal Justice