At first glance, San Jose's Valley Services looks like a typical construction recycling facility. Trucks roll in throughout the day, unloading piles of concrete and asphalt. Massive machines grind the material down, preparing it for use as landfill cover.

But beneath the dust and machinery lies a deeper kind of transformation, one that’s harder to see, but far more profound.

Daniel Perez, a manager at Valley Services, knows this transformation firsthand.

“This company changed my life,” Perez said. “It gave me the second chance nobody else would.”

Perez has worked at Valley Services for nine years. Before that, he spent much of his life in and out of prison, beginning at just 12 years old.

Upon his final release, Perez went looking to find work, but with his criminal backgroud, not to

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