Many issues that are primary drivers of mass incarceration cannot be remedied through government solutions alone. Issues such as broken families and mental health, both forever altered by over criminalization, cannot be simply be repaired through legislation. Civil Society has the unique capability to address certain social issues that government cannot, or to address them more effectively than government can. This section also addresses issues in which over-policing attempts to fix issues that should be handled through the community.
"Stockton is one of six American cities taking part in a new experiment funded by the Department of Justice. (The others are Birmingham, Ala.; Pittsburgh; Gary, Ind.; Fort Worth; and Minneapolis.) The cities are beginning programs to promote racial reconciliation; to address the racial biases all of us carry; and to gain the community’s trust using an idea known as procedural justice."
New York Times
July 26, 2018
Read More"Defy Ventures, founded in 2010, has a simple but unique mission: 'To end mass incarceration and to drastically reduce the rate convicted convicts re-offend after being let out' by instilling an understanding of entrepreneurship as a tool to "transform legacies and human potential'."
Inc
July 25, 2018
Read More"It may not be obvious to those who consume news digitally, and elect not to click on spot homicide coverage, but these stories make up a substantial portion of a newspaper on any given day. Open a local daily paper, and you’ll get a sense of a city under siege. Crime has declined drastically in the last two decades, but newspapers are still doing what they’ve always done: covering crime. "
Popula
July 24, 2018
Read More"Should any of these students become eligible for release, they could potentially use their experience and skills to find work and community on the outside, a challenge for many released inmates. Tending the bees also provides the women with an opportunity to go outside, collaborate with each other, and learn something new. It’s an antidote, Mahood says, to the monotony of day-to-day life behind bars."
Atlanta Magazine
July 18, 2018
Read More"The number of children with incarcerated parents may surprise you. As of 2010, 2.7 million children in the United States had a parent in jail or prison — or about one in every 28 minors, according to the IRP. Such high numbers are perhaps part of why so many organizations have made it their mission to help these children. Here are a few that could use your help."
Romper
July 17, 2018
Read More"'Serving time' is a misleading expression, because it suggests that a person is only serving time when confined behind the walls of a prison. The harsh reality is that people continue to 'serve time' by being denied food benefits, professional licenses and housing, as well as being subjected daily to the social stigma attached to a criminal conviction."
Charleston Gazette-Mail
July 15, 2018
Read More"While the First Step Act doesn’t tackle sentencing, Christian organizations see its use of faith-based programs as a critical to keeping felons out of prison. 'As Christians we suit up, we show up and we do what Christ would have us do we go into the prisons. As we heal the prisons in America, I think we heal the communities in America,' said DeRoche."
Christian Broadcasting Network
July 14, 2018
Read More"Group Project, a student group from MIT, is helping GrowingChange, a non-profit that works with previously incarcerated youth, to transform an old North Carolina prison into an agricultural community center. GrowingChange looks to take advantage of the small, decommissioned prisons scattered throughout the state's landscape. They see these sites as "places where communities can work together to provide clinical support, education, and vocational training as a means to divert youth from the criminal justice" system. "
Arch Daily
July 11, 2018
Read More"They realized that they had lost 13 employees to addiction over 10 years, and that half the cases were related to opioid drugs. 'They were not fired,' Mr. Perez said. 'They were dead'."
New York Times
July 10, 2018
Read More"To Yalamanchi and He, fixing the systems that created these traps seemed a monumental challenge. But, taken individually, these were problems they could solve. So, they launched the Shift Fund, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit that provides small — but hopefully life-changing — grants to people who are just a few hundred dollars away from getting their lives on track."
Philadelphia Inquirer
July 10, 2018
Read More"Scenes like this have been taking place across the Twin Cities thanks to the Lights On program, believed to be the first of its kind in the country. Instead of writing tickets for minor equipment problems, police officers are authorized to issue $50 coupons so motorists can have those problems fixed at area auto shops. Twenty participating police departments have given out approximately 660 coupons in a little more than a year."
Washington Post
July 7, 2018
Read More"At CUNY’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice, which is one of the institutions mentioned in the article, the answer is always yes. We are deeply engaged in finding innovative solutions to the entrenched societal problem of mass incarceration. We carry out this mission in ways both highly focused, and broadly supported by our identity as 'Fierce Advocates for Justice'."
The Chronicle of Higher Education
July 6, 2018
Read More"Each episode of Felony Miami centers around a different topic in the criminal justice world, from bail bonds to mass incarceration to public corruption. Now in its second season, the show's eclectic lineup of guests has included Miami-Dade chief public defender Carlos Martinez, activist and reality star Angela "Myammee" Pitts, and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School teacher Chris Mattox."
Miami New Times
July 5, 2018
Read More"The Portland Bail Fund, created to pay bail for black defendants who otherwise couldn't afford it, has raised close to $30,000 since May. Part of that money has been used to bail out Virgil Adams, 20, who spent nearly a year and a half in the Multnomah County jail without being convicted of a crime."
The Oregonian
July 4, 2018
Read More"When the philanthropist Agnes Gund launched the Art for Justice Fund last year, using the proceeds from the sale of a Roy Lichtenstein painting, the first round of grants focused on groups that work directly to change government policy, such as bail and sentencing reform, and those that help current and former prisoners through education, employment and creative programmes."
The Art Newspaper
June 29, 2018
Read More"Upon release from prison, ex-offenders often enter a world full of uncertainty. Where do you live? Where do you work? How do you survive? Mario Bueno tries to help people find these answers. He is the co-founder of Luck Inc., a non-profit headquartered in Detroit helping ex-offenders get on their feet."
Michigan Radio
June 29, 2018
Read More"Over the past three years, Freeman has been developing a low-sodium ramen that will soon be sold at correctional institution commissaries across the country. Along with honey buns, ramen noodles — typically the kind that comes in a plastic wrapper, made by the brands Maruchan or Nissin — are the most popular items at prison commissaries, filling the gap left by nutritionally inadequate and, at times, inedible correctional meals."
The Outline
June 29, 2018
Read More"Each year, about 23,000 inmates like Camper leave prisons in Ohio, and 640,000 are released from prisons across the country. Nearly two-thirds of them can’t find a job within the first year and a majority of them are arrested again within three years. Not getting a job doesn’t hurt just the former inmate, it hits the whole economy. One think tank estimated that the cost of not hiring felons is $87 billion in gross domestic product every year."
Politico
June 28, 2018
Read More"A small but ambitious nonprofit organization in Charleston called the Turning Leaf Project is taking the one approach that research seems to suggest actually works: It’s training habitual offenders to change how they think, and therefore how they act, with cognitive behavioral therapy. During CBT, patients learn to identify antisocial thoughts and then replace them with healthier ones; for years, this popular form of talk therapy has been used to treat depression, post-traumatic stress, eating disorders and other psychological problems."
The Marshall Project
June 26, 2018
Read More"When James Forman Jr. first came to New Haven to teach at Yale Law School he thought things might be different from what he had been seeing in Washington, D.C. — black people in authority locking up their own. In the case of New Haven, he found black public school officials, at least to some degree, deciding harshly the fate of black students."
New Haven Independent
June 22, 2018
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