ProGov21 Policy Library

Policing + Transit

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source Transit Center

Policy Areas Public Safety, Transportation & Mobility

Many transit agencies apply an overly punitive approach to minor transgressions. For example, this report argues that current methods of fare enforcement are too harsh. Fare evasion should be decriminalized, and the penalties should be made proportional to the severity of offense....

An Organizer’s Guide to Confront Pretrial Risk Assessment Tools in Decarceration Campaigns

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2019

Level State

State(s) All States

Source Community Justice Exchange

Policy Areas Civil Rights

Risk assessment tools (RATs) are decision-making rubrics that make predictions; they utilize a multitude of tools to make predictions about a defendant’s statistical likelihood, or “risk,” of not returning to court or being rearrested if released. Ultimately, RATs greatly influence...

No More Shackles: Ten Arguments Against Pretrial Electronic Monitoring

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County, State

State(s) All States

Source Media Justice

Policy Areas Data & Technology, Public Safety

This report outlines ten arguments against the use of pretrial electronic monitoring. It describes how monitoring restricts a person's ability to earn income; reduces access to legal resources and due process; limits participation in parenting and caregiving, increases the risk of...

A Social Media Toolkit: For Organizing and Advocacy to End Mass Criminalization and Incarceration

Type Fact Sheet or Infographic

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Community Justice Exchange

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Public Safety

Storytelling on social media has become a powerful tool to shift public narratives in the movement to end mass criminalization. However, if misused, improper storytelling runs the risk of perpetuating narratives that reinforce, rather than work to dismantle, the criminal justice system....

COVID-19: Release People From Prisons and Jails Without Electronic Monitoring

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County, State

State(s) All States

Source Media Justice

Policy Areas Data & Technology, Public Safety

This brief outlines six arguments opposing electronic monitors for people released from prisons and jails during the pandemic. The use of electronic monitoring violates social distancing, increases costs, misdirects resources, impacts access to healthcare, increases barriers to movement,...

No More Shackles: Why We Must End the Use of Electronic Monitors for People on Parole

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2019

Level City or Town, County, State

State(s) All States

Source Media Justice

Policy Areas Data & Technology, Public Safety

This report calls for the elimination of the use of monitoring for individuals on parole. It argues that electronic monitoring is an extension of incarceration that is ineffective, expensive, and greatly limits the freedom and potential success of people on parole. Further, its expansion...

Scan of Pretrial Practices

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2019

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Pretrial Justice Institute

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Data & Technology, Democracy & Governance, Public Safety

This report compares, critiques, and provides an overview of pretrial practices across the United States. In particular, it discusses how 89 counties differ (or relate) in using citation releases, bond schedules, pretrial assessment tools, and more. It also outlines shared concerns...

Updated Position on Pretrial Risk Assessment Tools

Type Fact Sheet or Infographic

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Pretrial Justice Institute

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Data & Technology, Public Safety

This document is a statement from the Pretrial Justice Institute (PJI) updating their stance on the use of Pretrial Risk Assessment Tools (RAIs). PJI opposes the use of pretrial RAIs when making detention decisions and determining restrictions placed on a person's pretrial liberty...

Selective Celling: Inmate Population in Ohio’s Private Prisons

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2001

Level City or Town, State

State(s) Ohio

Source Policy Matters Ohio

Policy Areas Civil Rights

This report discusses relevant research on prison privatization and presents concerns regarding the expansion of prison privatization across Ohio. The report also features three case studies which highlight some glaring issues with the implementation of private prisons in the state,...

Community Bail Funds as an Organizing Tool: A Primer for Exploring the Tactic

Type Fact Sheet or Infographic

Year 2019

Level City or Town, County, State

State(s) All States

Source Community Justice Exchange

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Community Development

This document is intended for organizers, legal advocates, and organizations contemplating starting a bail fund as an intervention in the criminal legal and/or immigration detention systems. The first part of the document poses core exploratory questions to consider before starting...

2017 Columbus Executive Order Declaring Sanctuary Status

Type Executive Order

Year 2017

Level City or Town

State(s) Ohio

Source Mayor of the City of Columbus

Policy Areas Democracy & Governance, Public Safety, Civil Rights

This executive order protects people without documentation from deportation and expands immigration protection services....

Youth Mandate for Education and Liberation: A Mandate to Guide Us from Crisis to Liberation

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2021

Level City or Town, State, National

State(s) All States

Source The Center for Popular Democracy

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Civil Rights, Education

This report articulates young people’s mandate to their government—local, state, and federal—to permanently end the school-to-prison-and-deportation pipeline and build a liberatory education system based on principles of inclusion, equity and racial justice. The key points of the...

Step-by-Step Guide to Drafting Your Own Community Safety Policy at the State Level

Type Fact Sheet or Infographic

Year 2022

Level State

State(s) All States

Source Civil Rights Corps

Policy Areas Community Development, Public Safety

A Community Safety Policy is a policy agenda that shifts the concept of “safety” from a primarily criminal-legal model to a new framework that roots safety in public health and makes investments in non-carceral solutions. This guide outlines four steps states can take to create their...

Increase Public Safety and Advance Racial Justice by Repealing Juvenile Curfews

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Local Progress

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Community Development, Public Safety

Roughly three-quarters of American cities have juvenile curfew laws that criminalize youth for being in public spaces during late night and school hours. These laws disproportionately punish black and brown youth and low-income families. This policy brief argues that juvenile curfew...

2020 San Francisco Ordinance 123-20 Prohibiting Revenue Collection from Incarcerated Individuals

Type Ordinance or Resolution

Year 2020

Level City or Town

State(s) California

Source San Francisco Board of Supervisors

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Economic Justice

This ordinance prohibits the city from making contracts or agreements with jail facilities that allow it to generate revenue from the sale of goods and services to inmates. It also explains how the city has previously generated funding through heavily marked up prices on phone calls...

So You Want to Courtwatch?

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2018

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Community Justice Exchange

Policy Areas Civil Rights

For decades, advocates, activists, and organizations have deployed courtwatching as a tactic to achieve a wide variety of outcomes, such as ensuring a more transparent criminal legal system, reporting on judges or prosecutors, gathering information for a campaign, providing individual...

The Case Against Pretrial Risk Assessment Instruments

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Pretrial Justice Institute

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Community Development, Public Safety

Pretrial risk assessment instruments (RAIs) are tools intended to estimate two key outcomes for those who are released pending trial: the likelihood that someone will fail to appear for court, and the likelihood that someone will be arrested for a new crime before the disposition...

Transparency is Not Enough: A Framework for Building Campaign Strategy

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year -

Level City or Town

State(s) All States

Source Community Justice Exchange

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Public Safety, Health

Activists, organizers, and reformers often demand transparency from the criminal legal system because of the harm the system inflicts behind closed doors—particularly upon Black and Brown, poor, LGBTQ, and immigrant communities. For organizers working to dismantle the criminal legal...

Guidelines for Respecting the Rights of Individuals on Electronic Monitors

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2019

Level City or Town, County, State

State(s) All States

Source Media Justice

Policy Areas Data & Technology, Public Safety

This brief establishes guidelines for the implementation of electronic monitoring. In order to respect the human rights of those being monitored, rules for electronic monitoring should be transparent and accommodate basic daily needs without imposing unnecessary restrictions; monitoring...

Kids Soar with Early Education Investments in Oregon

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2022

Level State

State(s) Oregon

Source Council for a Strong America

Policy Areas Children & Families, Education, Public Safety

One of the most effective ways to prevent crime is to provide children with the parental support and programs needed to be successful, productive members of society. This report discusses four steps Oregon policymakers should take to support children's success and improve public safety:...

Preventing and Mitigating Police-Involved Violence

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2017

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source State Innovation Exchange

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Civil Rights, Democracy & Governance, Housing, Public Safety, Public Safety, Civil Rights

Alarming rates of police brutality and abuse of power persist across U.S. cities and states, with 987 people shot and killed by law enforcement officers in 2017 alone. Victims of police-involved violence are disproportionately people of color, and a quarter of victims struggle with...

Proposed Public Health and Public Safety Pathways for Criminal Justice System Responses to COVID-19

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2020

Level City or Town, County

State(s) All States

Source Williams Institute

Policy Areas Public Spaces, Public Safety, Health

Incarceration puts both incarcerated people and corrections staff at risk of contracting COVID-19. A wide array of criminal justice stakeholders have come together to call for a public health-oriented approach to the COVID-19 crisis. The key recommendations include releasing incarcerated...

Joint Statement from Elected Prosecutors on Reproductive Rights

Type Ordinance or Resolution

Year 2022

Level Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) All States

Source Fair and Just Prosecution

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Health

Elected prosecutors from various regions issued a joint statement expressing concerns about the Supreme Court's decision to end the federally protected constitutional right to abortion established in Roe v. Wade. They argue that enforcing abortion bans would erode trust in the legal...

Community Voices: Barriers to Voting For California's Formerly Incarcerated

Type Policy Brief or Report

Year 2015

Level Other Boards and Agencies

State(s) California

Source The Greenlining Institute

Policy Areas Economic Justice, Civil Rights, Democracy & Governance

In addition to disenfranchising people through law and policy, felony disenfranchisement laws create additional barriers to voting. The complexity of these laws and a lack of awareness about them have caused confusion and misinformation among formerly incarcerated communities as well...

2) 2023 New York City Ordinance 1252 Establishing a Task Force Addressing Housing for Incarcerated Transgender Individuals

Type Ordinance or Resolution

Year 2023

Level City or Town

State(s) New York

Source City of New York

Policy Areas Civil Rights, Economic Justice, Housing

Transgender, gender nonconforming, and intersex individuals often face uninformed or discriminatory practices at the hands of public institutions. This ordinance establishes a task force to address policies related to the treatment of current or formerly incarcerated individuals within...

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