Humane Exposures

Affordable housing and homelessness together represents a statewide crisis that must be tackled by all levels of government, philanthropy, non-profits and businesses working together on collaborative solutions, says a new report by economic research firm ECONorthwest and commissioned by Oregon Community Foundation. The report shows that Oregon has a disproportionately large population of homeless people, when compared to other states. While Oregon’s population represents 1.3 ...percent of the total U.S. population, Oregon’s homeless population represents 2.6 percent of the total U.S. homeless population. The report suggests that the state’s homelessness and housing dilemmas are the result of two converging crises. First, an inadequate housing supply and rising rents that is leaving tens of thousands of Oregon children and families at risk of becoming homeless, and second, the persistence of a smaller population of chronically homeless people in need of intensive social services as well as specialized housing. Communities across the state are experiencing dramatic impacts of homelessness. In Jackson County, the homeless population hit a seven-year high. In Central Oregon, the number of adults living on the streets, under bridges, or in cars increased by 25.8 percent in 2017 - 2018. Conditions faced by Lane County’s growing unsheltered homeless population triggered the threat of a lawsuit, notes the report’s author, John Tapogna, President of ECONorthwest.

Taylor Lawrance was 15 years old when she broke into a Lake Hamilton home in 2015 with a group of friends, stealing clothes and a PlayStation from another teen. Taylor had texted one of her friends, who was armed with a shotgun, to enter the home while she spoke with the victim. Hours later, the teen was in handcuffs. Prosecutors opted to direct file the case, meaning that Lawrance was sentenced as an adult in 2016. She received 10 years in prison followed by 10 years of pro...bation after pleading no contest to burglary of a dwelling while armed with a firearm, robbery with a firearm and unlawful use of a two-way communication device. The prosecution of Taylor still resonates today with her mother, Kim Lawrance of Winter Haven, as she and dozens of others plan to rally in Tallahassee to end prosecutions of Florida children as adults. The decision to charge a child with an adult crime is one of the most important decisions we make here, Haas said. There are a small percentage of juveniles who commit violent, dangerous crimes and put our community at risk and the juvenile system is unable to handle those cases. Haas said charging children as adults isn’t as prevalent as it once was, representing fewer than two percent of all juvenile cases. In 2012, there were 159 juveniles charged as adults in the 10th Judicial Circuit, which includes Polk, Highlands and Hardee counties. Those numbers declined by 55 percent to 71 in 2018. And he pointed out that juvenile sanctions were still available to judges in adult court. The Senate version of the bill, filed by Democrat Bobby Powell of West Palm Beach, has made its way to a judiciary subcommittee on criminal and civil justice. First reading of the House version of the bill was on March 5. Public Defender Rex Dimmig said it’s not the first time there has been a push to make changes to the law. Last year, Dimmig said the bill failed to make it through a committee. See more

There’s a lot wrong with how we deal with criminals in our state and federal prison systems. Fortunately, there’s also a lot that Congress and the NY state Legislature can do right now to create a fairer, less expensive and safer incarceration system for the public. A bipartisan piece of reform legislation known as the First Step Act would reform sentencing and release guidelines in the federal prison system....Continue reading

It’s not every day the public gets a peek inside the courtroom of Erie County Family Court Judge Brenda M. Freedman. Freedman handles a variety of cases involving juveniles, so there’s limited access to the courtroom, to protect their privacy. But what you might notice, like Freedman did, is that far too many cases coming before the bench have a recurring, underlying theme: bullying.... While it has long been an issue for the schools, and often left for them to handle, the bullying spilling over into the juvenile justice system is a reminder of the wider problem. And it’s what led Freedman to spearhead an anti-bullying task force. From the court’s perspective, there are a high number of cases where youth are being hurt, because they’re victims of something that started with bullying, or where the youth are becoming perpetrators because they were victims of bullying. Freedman said. The problem is it leads to actual physical crimes, Freedman said. Actual physical assaults. Actual physical carrying of weapons. And because it leads to that, the judicial system is now involved. We need to try to stem this tide. https://buffalonews.com//bullying-prevention-moves-from-t/

30 percent of all incarcerated women worldwide are in the United States. And the number of women in U.S. prisons has risen more than 700 percent in the last 40 years. With that increase came a recognition that men and women in custody have different needs. Now, earlier this year, the Department of Justice's inspector general conducted a review of how the Federal Bureau of Prisons handles female inmates. Leaders from both organizations testified today on Capitol Hill, where De...mocrats and Republicans expressed concerns about prison conditions. The report, released in September, made several recommendations. Among them, provide better training for staff on needs of women and trauma victims. More than 85 percent of women in prison reported some physical or sexual trauma in their lifetime. Increase awareness of pregnancy programs for inmates. Just 37 percent of pregnant inmates participate in programs. And increase access to feminine hygiene products. https://www.pbs.org//american-prisons-are-hell-for-women-t

Weighing in once again on San Francisco’s homeless problem, tech billionaire Marc Benioff will announce Thursday that he is donating $6.1 million to turn an infamously seedy, long-shuttered Tenderloin hotel into housing for formerly homeless people. The Bristol Hotel on Mason Street will open the doors to its 58 spacious, refurbished rooms in February, and occupants will be chosen from supportive housing facilities. They will have to have lived for at least three years inside... one of those complexes, which provide on-site counseling, and show they have become sufficiently financially independent to get a good recommendation from their housing managers. The rents will range from $500 to $650 a month, and those low prices will be made possible by Benioff’s donation. The idea, he said, is to give the new tenants the best possible chance of saving income, planning for their futures and maintaining full independence. This is just the beginning of what I hope will be a parade of the type of investments that have been identified by the Proposition C campaign, said Benioff, who is co-CEO of Salesforce, the city’s largest private employer. Benioff donated millions of dollars of personal and corporate money to help pass a new business tax this month that would raise $300 million annually for homeless programs. This project at the Bristol is a great example of that. We can do this. When you give a person a home, everything gets better, Benioff said. It’s the fundamental catalyst to improving a person’s livelihood. The Bristol has been closed for nearly four years. Before that it was known for decades as a beacon for drug dealers and other down-and-outers, including the infamous Night Stalker serial killer Richard Ramirez in the 1980s. Owner Bill Thakor bought the building in 1998, and after struggling with its sketchy nature he shut it down and has poured $3.5 million since then into fixing it up.

In the U. K. women are twice as likely as men to receive harsher sentences for assault offences when intoxication is a contributing factor. Sentencing guidelines for assault published in 2011 set out that both alcohol and drug intoxication may aggravate an offence on the basis of its seriousness. However, any justification for this position is surprisingly absent in sentencing guidance. The Sentencing Council also offers little practical direction on the extent to which alcohol intoxication should aggravate sentence outcomes, for whom, and in which contexts.

Low unemployment rates make it increasingly difficult for employers to find quality workers for lower-wage, entry-level positions. I want to posit a concept that can help employers access quality workers in tight labor markets while having the added benefit of curbing our swelling recidivism crisis all while being fiscally responsible. In 2018, Arkansas ranks sixth in the nation regarding the percentage of citizens incarcerated per 100,000 people; that’s not a statistic we ...Continue reading

Here’s what I propose to do within my first year on City Council to address the crisis: 1) Understand the Situation on the Ground. I pledge to personally meet with as many individuals experiencing homelessness as I can in District 1, so I can be better informed about each person’s individual circumstances. I’ve begun this process by visiting the Emergency Storm Shelter. We need to talk with people who are homeless and maintain better data on the homeless population if we ...Continue reading

When minors are sent to juvenile detention, their families lose a child to the system and, in some states, are often left with hundreds of dollars in fees but the county of Los Angeles is trying to change that. On October 9, the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors approved a motion to stop collecting fees after juvenile delinquents are incarcerated, ending a practice criminal justice advocates described as an unfair tax on minorities that didn't even contribute to rehabilitati...on, according t.A.'s probation department suspended charging new fees in 2009, but continued to collect payment for unpaid fees that existed prior to 2009. According to the L.A. Times, at the time, fees were $23.63 a day for juvenile halls and $11.94 a day for probation camps. The decision made earlier this month, sponsored and authored by supervisors Hilda Solis and Janice Hahn, means the probation department will no longer accept payment from and cancel about $90-million worth of debt held by 52,000 juvenile offenders and their families,o the Los Angeles Times. Research by the Vera Institute of Justice, which looked at a similar practice in New Orleans, connects juvenile detention fees with a likelihood that the same person will be incarcerated again. Other research showed that many of the families who have to pay these fees often fall into debt because they are disproportionately low-income people of color. L.A.'s probation department suspended charging new fees in 2009, but continued to collect payment for unpaid fees that existed prior to 2009. According to the L.A. Times, at the time, fees were $23.63 a day for juvenile halls and $11.94 a day for probation camps. The decision made earlier this month, sponsored and authored by supervisors Hilda Solis and Janice Hahn, means the probation department will no longer accept payment from and cancel about $90-million worth of debt held by 52,000 juvenile offenders and their families

Agape Youth Camp, a free four-day camp for children ages 7 to 17 who have a parent in prison. It’s a heartening story of summertime fun. The kids swim, ride horses, work on craft projects and, if they choose, talk about their lives with others whose parents are behind bars. But it’s also part of a much bigger story the story of those a National Institute of Justice calls the hidden victims of the United States’ incarceration boom. Since the 1970s, the number of Americans ...Continue reading

it's safe to estimate that between 10 percent and 20 percent of Danish prisoners are currently enrolled in an educational program. A recent meta-study from May 2018, published in the Journal of Experimental Criminology, examines a total of 57 studies conducted in the US on the issue over the past 37 years. The report concludes that the inmates who participate in educational programs were 28 percent less likely to relapse into a life of crime compared to their fellow inmates who have not participated in a program while serving a sentence. https://www.vice.com//studying-degree-prison-denmark-what-

A new state law will allow Arizona veterans struggling with homelessness to get a driver's license or ID card without paying a fee. The law, which took effect in September, allows the Arizona Department of Transportation Motor Vehicle Division to waive the $25 fee. Other fees such as those relating to license suspension or revocation and road tests may also be waived, according to a press release. Having a license or ID card is essential to so many aspects of life and this n...ew law will make it easier for less-fortunate veterans to get one of those credentials, said MVD Stakeholder Relations Manager Jennifer Bowser-Richards. The MVD must verify the customer’s status as a veteran. http://www.azfamily.com//new-arizona-law-helps-homeless-ve

Cities can't make it a crime to sleep on a public street or sidewalk when no homeless shelters are available, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday in a case that could affect so-called "sit/lie" ordinances in San Francisco and elsewhere. The constitutional ban on "cruel and unusual punishment," under the Eighth Amendment, prohibits "criminal penalties for sitting, sleeping, or lying outside on public property for homeless individuals who cannot obtain shelter," said the Nint...Continue reading