U of R students study employment fairness for convicted criminals

When Manmit Dhami was in her sophomore year attending the University of Redlands she reluctantly took Jennifer Tilton’s Race and Criminal Justice class to satisfy an ethic studies requirement.

That class changed her.

“I feel so empowered now,” said Dhami, now a junior. “I feel like I’m a part of a community. I feel like what I’m doing matters. I’m changing people’s lives in positive ways.”

Dhami and the rest of her class spent last year researching implementation of Assembly Bill 218 — or “the Ban the Box initiative,” passed in July, 2014, which gives people convicted of a crime more access to public jobs from the city, county and state level.

But her classmates’ research found that the Inland area is not implementing the rule change. Some cities in Riverside and San Bernardino counties didn’t even know the law existed according to Tilton, who led the study.

They will present “report cards” at a town hall meeting, and launch the The IE Fair Chance Coalition today from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at the San Bernardino Diocese, 1201 E. Highland Ave. in San Bernardino. The group is made up of U of R students and faculty and community leaders, including Time for Change Foundation, Riverside All of Us or None, Starting Over Inc., Center for Employment Opportunities, IE Concerned African American Churches, Inland Congregations United for Change, California Partnership and the ACLU of Southern California.

The U of R report that several human resource policies are not written or sufficiently detailed to guarantee fair or consistent evaluation of criminal records in the hiring process. They say application language often discourages people with criminal records from applying and does not clearly state a commitment to fair hiring.

Riverside County received the highest grade, with a B. Lake Elsinore, Fontana, Highland and San Bernardino County all received Ds. The grades measured the existing barriers to fair hiring and provided departments with a roadmap for change.

“Until you work in partnership with the community, they don’t understand substantial problems around them or understand how to actually change policies,” said Tilton. “They feel powerless. Connecting them with community leaders doing the changes they want to see is the first step.”

Junior Raquel Anakalea was one of the students who felt powerless.

“My dad has been in and out of prison my whole life,” said Anakalea. “I’m not close to him because he’s been in and out of my life.”

She was raised by her mom, aunt and grandmother. It was hard on them because he was unable to get employed because of his criminal background. Even now he isn’t able to help her pay for her tuition, books or housing.

“I have issues that most people on this campus just don’t have to face,” said Anakalea. “Jobs, that’s the biggest most obvious way to end the cycle of recidivism.”

Senior Jewel Patterson has lived in San Bernardino County her whole life and has members in her family who are unable to find good public jobs because of their criminal background. She was part of the first class to work on the project. She conducted interviews with people who had served time.

“We got stories from formerly incarcerated people,” said Patterson. “We wanted to put a face on the issue.”

The students spent two years researching HR departments. In addition to the interviews they called HR departments, followed up with elected officials poured through public policy documents and spent hours on phones with lawyers. Each of the women has been subsequently volunteering with nonprofits involved in criminal justice and launching IE Fair Chance Coalition to give a voice to people who have been discriminated against because of their criminal background.

This was Tilton’s goal all along, to connect students to issues affecting the community and get them to be agents of change.

“I wanted them to do some research useful in the community to understand how public policies played out in the Inland Empire,” said Tilton. “I’m so proud of the work they have done. They’re having a tangible positive impact in the community. The work they’re doing is giving HR departments a roadmap to better implement this law.”

Tilton also wanted to change stigmas around people with criminal records.

Dhami’s research focused on the city of San Bernardino. But that’s not the biggest impact the class had. Her older sister has been incarcerated twice. After her sister got out of jail her family treated her differently, and so did Dhami.

“Oh I totally had a stigma and that hurt my relationship with her. I was like, oh yeah she’s a criminal, she wasn’t my big sister anymore. These stigmas hurt people and hurt families. I reconnected with my sister. She saw the work I did on the campaign on Facebook and was proud.



“It’s become so much more than a class. The people who we worked with they had a positive impact on my life too.”

AB 1321 Passes: California Will Set Up Nutrition Incentive Program!

Governor Jerry Brown signed AB 1321 (Ting), which will set up the infrastructure for the Market Match program already running using mostly private funding throughout California. This is a tremendous victory that will be essential in scaling up the Market Match program, benefitting low income California residents struggling to afford healthy food, as well as the state’s small farm sector.

Tremendous thanks are owed to Roots of Change, the organization which sponsored the legislation and organized the advocacy efforts, from Northern California to the Central Valley to LA to San Diego, at every step of the way through the legislative process.

Hunger Action LA operates Market Match at 20 markets now in LA County, with the newest programs just beginning in the past month in Pasadena, Downtown LA, Santa Fe Springs and Eagle Rock. Our colleagues at SEE LA operate the program at 5 additional markets. AB 1321’s passage should pave the way for a bright future for the program.

Thank you, very much, to all of you who made phone calls and wrote letters of support---multiple times!---for the program. It’s another testament to the power of people’s voices if we but use them, in policy issues that affect us all.

Via: Hunger Action Los Angeles
http://www.hungeractionla.org/news_update_oct_13th_2015#ab1p

Governor Signs New Law Ending Fee for Sealing Juvenile Records

On September 30, 2015 Governor Brown signed into law SB 504, "Starting Over Strong", authored by Sen. Ricardo Lara. This new law removes California's fee for juvenile record-sealing, so that youth who turn 18 no longer need to pay to file court petitions to seal records of juvenile adjudications.

"We seek to restore the civil rights of all formerly incarcerated people, and making record-sealing free will help young Californians get jobs so they can support their families," said Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children (LSPC), a co-sponsor of SB 504.

Every year, thousands of California youth are arrested. When they turn 18 and apply for jobs, many are denied employment for past mistakes. People with minor (non-serious) records are eligible to have them sealed, but most counties have charged fees (up to $150) for this service, which was cost-prohibitive to young people who lack jobs but want to Start Over Strong. This change will save millions of dollars as young people become able to seal their records, stay employed, and stay out of jail. Every person who gets a job generates payroll taxes for the state budget, and also saves the state the extremely expensive cost of incarceration. The fee itself generated less than half a million dollars in state revenue annually.

This new law improves economic outcomes for California’s youth and, in so doing, protects public safety by eliminating an unnecessary barrier to reentry for youth who are eligible for and seeking the juvenile record sealing remedy. Juvenile records can create barriers to employment and housing. An unsealed juvenile record can appear on a background checks, and lead to an unfairly adverse employment or housing decision. Without stable employment and housing, there is a higher chance that young people will recidivate and become involved in the adult criminal justice system.

SB 504 (Lara) was co-sponsored by LSPC, Youth Justice Coalition of Los Angeles, East Bay Community Law Center, and the California Public Defenders Association.

LSPC organizes communities impacted by the criminal justice system and advocates to release incarcerated people, to restore human and civil rights and to reunify families and communities. LSPC builds public awareness of structural racism in policing, the courts, and prison system, and advances racial and gender justice. LSPC's strategies include legal support, trainings, advocacy, public education, grassroots mobilization, and developing community partnerships.



Via: Legal Services for Prisoners with Children

Victory in Sacramento! Brown signed SB 219!

On Sunday, we celebrated a major victory for incarcerated people and their families: Governor Brown signed SB 219, a bill co-sponsored by CURB and Justice Now that will expand access to the Alternative Custody Program! 

We couldn’t have done it without you.

Your letters, emails, phone calls, and tweets sent a clear message that Californians are determined to fight the devastation of imprisonment, and are willing to take action to support incarcerated people and their families.

Thanks to your fighting spirit, more people will be able to finish their sentences in the community so they can care for their children and dependent family members.

We hope the momentum created by this victory can help us continue our fight to reduce the number of prisons and jails and the number of people incarcerated, and invest in strong and healthy communities.

We hope this victory can be another stepping stone in a new path forward for California.

Via: http://curbprisonspending.org/ 

Please VOTE for Kim Carter for 2015 CNN Hero of the Year!

Dear Friends,

I am overwhelmed by the gratefulness I am feeling right now. I am so blessed to be clean and sober and recognizing that my only purpose in life is to fight for others that have been through the same injustices as I have experienced.

On October 8th CNN selected me and my organization, Time for Change Foundation, for the work we do to help others. To be chosen as a 2015 Top 10 CNN Hero from 50,000 nominations across the world we sit here humbled and awestruck.

But it doesn’t stop here. To reach the grand prize of $100,000 that will help us to continue our mission we NEED YOUR HELP to get the most votes!

You can VOTE by clicking the link below and you can VOTE ONCE a day EVERY DAY until November 15th.

VOTE4KIM

I just want to thank God, for giving me a second chance at life and using me to help fight for others! For those of you who don't know my story, I'm a miracle! Devastated by crack addiction, incarceration and homelessness for years and to suddenly be reborn and purposeful is a blessing.

Thank you to everyone that has fought this fight with me in solidarity! I know I didn’t come this far without you.

Please cast your votes, share that you voted, and ask others to do the same!


Thank you!

Kim Carter

Executive Director

Time for Change Foundation

California to register voters automatically at DMV

In a bid to improve voter turnout in California elections, Gov. Jerry Brown on Saturday signed legislation to automatically register to vote anyone who has a driver’s license or state identification card.

The measure was pushed by Democrats, whose candidates and causes typically benefit from higher turnout elections.

Assembly Bill 1461, by Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego, will require the state to register adults to vote when they get or renew a driver’s license, unless they opt out. It will make California only the second state, after Oregon, to proactively register people to vote unless they decline.

The California legislation was a priority of Secretary of State Alex Padilla and followed the state’s record-low turnout in last year’s elections.

“In a free society, the right to vote is fundamental,” Padilla said in a statement after Brown announced signing the bill. “We do not have to opt-in to other rights, such as free speech or due process. The right to vote should be no different.”

The law will expand access to the polls as dozens of states are implementing significant new electoral restrictions, such as requiring photo identification to vote and cutting back on early voting. It drew praise from voting rights advocates and even Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, who tweeted that other states should follow California’s lead.

“California just became a national leader on voting rights,” Myrna Pérez, deputy director of the Democracy Program at New York University School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice, said in a statement. “In too many states, our outdated and error-prone registration system blocks millions from the polls. Automatic permanent voter registration can transform voting in America. Other states should look to California as a bold new model for reform.”

Democrats said the measure would increase the ranks of people – particularly the young, poor and nonwhite – engaged in the political process. Republicans mostly opposed the measure. They warned it risked allowing people eligible to get driver’s licenses, but who are noncitizens and ineligible to vote, to register and cast fraudulent ballots.

Democratic lawmakers countered that the bill included protections to prevent that from happening.

In November, only 42.2 percent of voters showed up, the lowest participation in a general election since World War II, according to a committee analysis of the measure. The turnout rate reflected just 31 percent of the state population eligible to vote, including an estimated 6.6 million Californians not registered.

“Our democracy depends on the true participation of the populace,” state Sen. Ben Allen, D-Santa Monica, said during a floor debate last month.

The measure sought to build upon the federal Motor Voter Law, which required voter registration forms to be available at motor vehicle agencies. More than 20 years later, though, experts said the paper-based law’s impact has been spotty, with few states able to detail how their agencies are helping people register to vote or update their registrations.

In Oregon, an automatic registration law took effect earlier this year, with full implementation due in January. Election officials automatically register people to vote when the state’s motor vehicle agency relays information that the people are eligible. They can apply to opt out.

“I just think we’re getting the cart before the horse,” state Sen. Joel Anderson, R-Alpine, said last month.

Under the law, automatic voter registration would not take place until the state’s long-awaited voter database, VoteCal, is up and running; there is a system in place to protect the transfer of noncitizen information; and money has been appropriated by the Legislature.

Assemblyman Kevin McCarty, D-Sacramento, introduced the measure along with Gonzalez and Assemblyman Luis Alejo, D-Watsonville.

Via: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article38684598.html

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article38684598.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article38684598.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article38684598.html#storylink=cpy