I grabbed a great seat for Tuesday’s State House hearing on the minimum wage. I wanted a seat with a good view of the folks testifying. Rachael Collins and her colleagues from the Restaurant Opportunities Center United slid into seats next to me. By noon, Gardner Auditorium was filled to capacity .
The SEIU 1199 organizer sitting to my left shared good information with me. His personal story itself was a testimony to the value of a strong bedrock minimum wage. His parents were teens when he was born, which judging by his salt and pepper hair might have been in the late seventies. In his childhood, they supported themselves through minimum wage work.
He also told me about a conversation he had with a hardware store owner. The owner said that at a $15/hr minimum wage, he would hire only adults, no teens. Presumably, in his view, teens are not mature enough take the responsibility of work. If that’s the sentiment of most employers, it could be bad news for teens. On the other hand, employers should take to heart their responsibility to hold a teen employee accountable as they would an older one.
I remember a good friend telling me that her teenage son, who wouldn’t pick up a wet towel in the bathroom let alone keep his room neat or remember to take out the trash, was a completely different person at his job at a CVS store. He was consistently on time and on task at the store. She gave the store manager and the paycheck credit for the new man she saw in her son.
Teens, especially in lower income levels, have financial obligations to themselves and their families that they might not have had years ago. They need and deserve the full minimum wage to start off their work career.
Regrettably, I had to leave the hearing early. The panels of speakers in support of the badly needed wage increase were extraordinary. It’s clear to me and to just about all the people in the auditorium that the time to raise the wage to $15/hr for workers has come—regardless of their age.
“The new law will add roughly one million new eligible voters to the voter rolls,” said the statement, signed by Pam Wilmot of Common Cause Massachusetts, Meryl Kessler of the League of Women Voters of Massachusetts, Beth Huang of Mass Voter Table, Janet Domenitz of MASSPIRG, Cheryl Clyburn Crawford of MassVote and Jonathan Cohn of Progressive Massachusetts. “Similar laws in other states have been proven to increase turnout and make elections more secure by modernizing the voter registration process. It is a common sense and long overdue reform.”
Click through for a review of the historic SJC Lunn decision, Gov. Baker’s proposal to overturn it, Safe Communities Act and the foot dragging of Massachusetts Democrats.
Taking Beacon Hill by surprise, House Ways and Means Chairman Brian Dempsey (D-Haverhill) announced his resignation from the House of Representatives last Wednesday, to take a position at the corporate lobbying firm ML Strategies in September.
Dempsey, a conservative Democrat who has overseen the drafting of several austerity budgets, was widely viewed as next in line for Speaker of the House. He also played a leading role last session in weakening the solar incentive bill and the omnibus energy bill, and sided with the big business group AIM on the Equal Pay bill, Noncompetes, and the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.
One of ML Strategies’ clients is Wynn Casinos–perhaps a reason for a last minute addition to the FY18 budget allowing casinos to serve drinks until 4 a.m. Needless to say, Progressives in Massachusetts will not be missing him.
A New Way on Ways & Means?
Ways & Means is by far the most powerful committee. Any legislation that involves public money must go through both the W&M in both the House and Senate. In that space, W&M can—and sometimes does—change legislation, with zero transparency or democracy. Any policies that require funding can be rendered ineffective by W&M’s level of funding for it, too.
These Ways and Means Committees are not required under the Legislature’s rules to report out any bill that is referred there. Therefore the Committees are frequently graveyards.
And, yeah, Ways and Means Committees write the budget. As they say, whoever holds the purse strings holds the power.
Over the weekend, Rep. Jeffrey Sanchez (D-Mission Hill) was named the next chair of the committee. Sanchez represents one of the most progressive districts in the state. What does this mean for the committee?
In our scorecards for the last two legislative sessions (188th, 189th), Sanchez fared modestly better than Dempsey and Speaker DeLeo. Each case, the difference was a result of Sanchez standing up for the rights of undocumented residents. And unlike Dempsey, Sanchez is a co-sponsor of the Safe Communities Act.
However, beyond those votes, Sanchez has a history of voting in lockstep with the Speaker, right or wrong. And his name is missing on the list of co-sponsors of key bills this session–from the $15 minimum wage to paid family and medical leave to single payer health care to ending mandatory minimum sentences. And under his chairmanship of the Health Care Financing Committee, the House has not taken the necessary steps to improve the quality and reduce the cost of care. Last session, Sanchez as the House chair sent single-payer legislation to study.
How will Sanchez be as the new chairman of this most powerful committee? Will there be a new spirit of transparency, collaboration in this new tenure? We’ll find out.
With his ascension to this powerful position, the role of progressive organizers within his district–like the great activists at JP Progressives–becomes even more important to the state as a whole.
Stepping Stones and Musical Chairs
As noted above, the Ways & Means Chairmanship is often seen as a stepping stone to the Speaker’s office. Although the House has abolished term limits for the Speaker, DeLeo may ultimately choose to retire. And it’s important to make sure that the next Speaker has a progressive vision for the state.
A strong coalition can be built, as noted by Rep. Russell Holmes (D-Mattapan):
Now is the time for the Massachusetts Black and Latino Legislative Caucus, the Progressive Caucus, the Women’s Caucus to be strong and united in our selection of the next speaker of the House. We should not do this individually; we should do this together so our voices are heard.
We couldn’t agree more. If the Progressive Caucus is to exist in more than name, then it should take on a more assertive role in shaping the direction of the State House.
Apparently, Speaker DeLeo doesn’t agree. In the committee shakeup that followed Sanchez’s promotion, DeLeo stripped Holmes of his vice chairmanship of the Joint Committee of Housing. Two years ago, DeLeo stripped Rep. Jonathan Hecht (D-Watertown) of a vice chairmanship after Hecht spoke out against abolishing term limits.
The centralization of power in the Speaker’s office has been a hurdle to the progressive legislation that would make Massachusetts live up to its liberal reputation.
If DeLeo stays at the helm for another four to five years, progressive legislators need a plan to push the Speaker for a bolder legislative agenda to invest in our schools and infrastructure, reduce inequality, reform our broken criminal justice system, model a transition to clean energy, protect and expand the rights of marginalized populations, and on and on. And if they don’t have a plan, then activists need to make them.
Four to five years is a long time. For persons suffering under injustice and insecurity, two is a long time, too.
But progressives, both inside and outside the State House, need to think long-term as well. The caucuses described by Rep. Holmes could place their support for the Next Speaker behind one person, and dramatically alter the future of progressive legislation. While the very rapid ascension of Sanchez to W/M chair puts him on an important stepping stone towards speakership, it is not by any means a fait accompli, and certainly the rank and file have the option of exercising their power for larger progressive goals.
This would take discipline, focus, and an ability to put the Common Good ahead of individual legislators’ narrow self interests—which too often are reduced to fears of conservatives’ wrath, and almost never liberals’ disappointments. It would be a glorious thing to see; there are moments of stepping up and changing the narrative—this is one of those for House Progressives (and every caucus whose aims have been stepped over for austerity budgets and corporate comforts).
At the very least, or, less inspiringly, come up with a key set of issue priorities, expectations, and rules reforms that the leading contenders for the next Speaker of the House would commit to.
Given that the House has already sought to water down or stop even very modest progressive policies in recent years, the stakes could not be higher.
The 190th legislative session has been off to a slow start on Beacon Hill. Beyond the pay raise, and the budget process, the Legislature has not been doing much in the way of, well, legislating.
One small bit of progress was the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which passed the House unanimously last month. The bill requires employers to provide “reasonable accommodation” for pregnant women and nursing mothers (such as more frequent breaks, less strenuous duties, and the ability to sit down on the job) provided that they don’t cause “significant difficulty or expense.”This new bill is not as strong as the one introduced last session—which Speaker DeLeo and others in the Democratic leadership, doing the bidding of powerful business interests, blocked. Like much progressive legislation, the bill died in committee. The 2017 bill resulted from negotiations between women’s advocacy group MotherWoman and the Associated Industries of Massachusetts (AIM). And although it was watered down to get AIM on board, the bill was nonetheless a positive development for women across the Commonwealth.
But because of the House’s standard lack of transparency, it was almost watered down even further.
As the Globe reported on Thursday, the powerful Ways & Means Committee quietly changed one word in the bill in committee before it went to a vote:
But it emerged from the House Committee on Ways and Means for a full vote on the floor with the word “knowingly” added at the beginning of that sentence. The language passed in the House without anyone noticing the change, and now the bill awaits a vote in the Senate.
It’s an addition that advocates for these pregnant worker protections say creates a serious new layer of what a worker would have to prove if she felt there was discrimination in her denial of a job. To prove an employer acted “knowingly” requires direct evidence that the employer knew the applicant was pregnant and denied them a job because of it — a much higher standard of proof.
Neither sponsors of the bill nor key advocates, who helped negotiate the legislation, were notified. AIM claimed to have not been behind the change–though it was clearly done in their interest.
“When Mexico sends its people, it’s not sending its best…They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
That is a direct quote from our current President. In his dark view of the world, the United States is under assault by a horde of dangerous immigrants unleashing a wave of violence against hapless citizens. There’s only one tiny problem with this view-it’s completely false.
It should come as no surprise to see once again that Trump and his henchmen live in an alternate reality.
Contrary to Trump’s hysterical fever dreams, immigrants (undocumented or otherwise) do not commit violent crimes any more than other groups. This deserves reiteration, because our beliefs have been warped by decades of television and movies pushing this false narrative. If immigrants are so much more dangerous, why did violent crime decline by 34% from 1994 to 2005, while the foreign born population increased by 71%? The national crime rate has dropped sharply over the last few decades, including in areas where the number of undocumented immigrants grew significantly. Areas with a larger immigrant population (including undocumented) have lower crime rates, after controlling for other factors. They have incarceration rates below native born Americans. So whatever our immigration policy is, it should reflect the fact that the undocumented are not responsible for this nonexistent crime wave.
This rhetoric about criminals serves as a distraction from the large number of people without criminal records who have also been deported. Maribel Trujillo, a mother of four US citizen children, a business owner who has lived in the US for 15 years, was deported in April. In Lawrence, five were arrested when they appeared for scheduled meetings with USCIS, some of which were to begin the green card process. None of the people in these examples had a criminal record, and this is not unusual. The number of deportees without criminal records has more than doubled during Trump’s time in office, to more than 10,800 so far. By the end of Obama’s term, the official deportation policy was “Felons, not families” yet even under this policy, many of those deported had no criminal record. Far from being a champion of the undocumented, Obama oversaw the deportation of 2.4 million people, more than any previous president. Trump wants to go even further, and his administration’s policies expand the deportation priority from criminals to potentially anyone.
In this cold discussion of “immigration enforcement,” we must never forget the human face of it–families broken apart. To keep families whole, and to make sure that the job of the police is to keep us safe, not deport our neighbors, Massachusetts should become a sanctuary state.
Prevent state and local government from using their resources to aid in the enforcement of immigration law. It does allow the use of houses of corrections to hold people in ICE custody, provided the use is reimbursed. This will allow potential deportees to remain closer to home, closer to their families and legal aid. Detainees who are sent to remote locations are on average held months longer before deportation or release.
Prohibits law enforcement from asking about someone’s immigration status, except as required by law or as necessary to investigate a crime.
Prohibits law enforcement agencies or the RMV from contributing information to federal attempts to register people on the basis of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or national or ethnic origin. In other words, we won’t help make the infamous Muslim registry.
Prohibits law enforcement from detaining or arresting anyone solely for immigration purposes, and prohibits any state or local personnel from acting as immigration agents.
Prohibits the honoring of detainer requests and requires that the determination of bail ignore the detainer. Detainers are requests for local law enforcement to hold people who have been arrested an extra 48 hours, if they are suspected to be undocumented, giving ICE a chance to come pick them up. To be clear, under the proposed law, an arrested person would not be released early because of immigration status, it would simply stop them from being held past their lawful release time because of a detainer request. This is consistent with how criminal justice works for citizens. Many arrests are made for minor crimes that do not carry a long jail time as punishment, and many charges are dismissed. Furthermore, not everyone arrested is guilty-don’t forget, “innocent until proven guilty.” For those charged with more serious crimes, law enforcement and the courts will, as always, consider the severity of the alleged crime, flight risk, and other factors before deciding whether to release them and how much to charge for bail. So people who likely pose a danger to the public will not be released, just like now.
Requires that the person in local custody must give consent for a DHS agent to interview them. Requires that they be informed of their rights if an interview is requested. (It’s hard to exercise your rights if you don’t know what they are). If they ask for an attorney, no interview may take place without the attorney’s presence.
Proponents of strict immigration enforcement often argue that breaking immigration law is breaking the law, and lawbreakers should be prosecuted. But step back a second. Do we hold people in prison for months for jaywalking? No. That’s breaking the law too, so why not? Because we follow the principle of “the punishment should fit the crime.” Along those lines, the punishment for jaywalking is typically a small fine. To address lawbreaking, we have a range of possible responses, including prison, probation, rehabilitation programs, or fines. For those who break immigration law, the choices don’t have to be either deport or do nothing, and as a society we need to have a conversation about what the appropriate policy is.
Being undocumented simply means you are in the country without permission. (Far from the dramatic border crossing we may envision from movies, most undocumented entered the country legally but overstayed their visas. The largest group of those who overstay are Canadians). For those who have been here for a long while, deportation means the disruption of an entire life–losing a job, losing a home, and being separated from family. To me, that seems like far too harsh of a punishment for failing to file paperwork.
The undocumented may not be citizens, but that does not mean they should have no civil rights protections–human rights do not depend on where you were born or where you live. They aren’t given as many protections in immigration proceedings, but the courts have repeatedly affirmed that they at least have a right to due process.
To avoid levying a punishment much more severe than the crime warrants, the individual circumstances of each potential deportee should be considered. If they have strong ties to the US such as a spouse or children who are US citizens or permanent residents, deportation should not be done lightly. In the case of individuals who have committed crimes, that means looking at the severity of their crime to decide whether it warrants deportation and whether their expulsion would have a large disruptive effect on the local community. (Is it really better for society if children lose their parents for a minor non-violent crime?) Now compare this nuanced approach, which addresses our border security and public safety needs without neglecting civil rights, to what Trump wants to do.
During his campaign, Trump swore to deport all 11 or so million undocumented immigrants. Later on, he relented and promised to deport “only” the two or three million that he believes are criminals (although it’s disputed if there are that many with a criminal record, and many of those have a record for a minor crime), but his actions as President have hewed closer to his original position.
He may be a pathological liar, but so far he really does seem to be trying to keep many of his campaign promises. To this end, he has signed a few executive orders on immigration. Among other things, he calls for the building of the notorious wall along the border, the building and staffing of detention centers, the hiring of 5000 more border patrol agents, and he instructs the attorney general to have federal prosecutors prioritize offenses somehow connected to the border (diverting resources away from other pressing concerns). More directly relevant to Massachusetts, he gets local jurisdictions tangled up in enforcing federal immigration laws by calling for the cooperation of state and local governments in enforcing those laws, deputizing local and state law enforcement to act as immigration agents, expanding who is considered a priority for deportation, and ordering that federal funding be cut off to sanctuary jurisdictions.
We don’t have to guess how this will turn out–these policies have been tried before. Essentially, he is reinstating and reinvigorating two programs that have a troubled history of civil rights abuses, namely Secure Communities and 287(g) agreements.
Secure Communities was established under Bush in 2008 and was repealed by Obama in 2014 after strong criticism of the program. Under it, when someone was arrested, their fingerprints were sent to ICE to do an immigration check. If the fingerprints matched someone ICE believed to be deportable, they would issue a detainer request, asking that law enforcement hold the person for up to 48 hours past their scheduled release so that ICE could have time to pick them up. It sounds innocuous, unless you delve into the results as revealed by a study of the program from 2008 to 2011.
First of all, families were broken apart. Through 2011, 83,000 families with US citizens were affected by the program, and 39% of those deported had citizens in their family.
The fraction of people deported with no criminal record or with arrests for a minor crime grew significantly when Secure Communities was in force: 45% had committed serious crimes, but 29% were accused of minor offenses, especially traffic violations, and 26% had no convictions. This means that more than half had a history of only minor offenses or no crime at all. In Massachusetts it was worse–in 2013, 55% had no criminal record whatsoever. ICE triumphantly pointed to the growing fraction of “criminal aliens” it deported under Secure Communities, but most of that increase was due to an increasing proportion of people deported for breaking immigration or traffic related laws.
This suggests that when ICE had to expend its own resources to track down undocumented immigrants, actual threats to society were prioritized. But when local law enforcement had done the work for them, they jumped at the opportunity to deport anyone, even if that person was not dangerous. Safe Communities, in contrast, will help keep the focus on dangerous criminals.
Under Trump’s executive order, once again peaceful, productive members of society are being indiscriminately deported. We must protect our neighbors. By refusing to cooperate at the local level, we will reduce the number of people deported, and lower the number of families broken apart.
Secure Communities has a poor record on respecting due process. Potential deportees, in principle, are typically supposed to get a hearing where a judge will determine their fate. They are also allowed a lawyer, although the government will not pay for it. We have a perverse system where because breaking immigration law is considered a civil rather than a criminal offense, there is no right to a lawyer, even though they are treated very much like criminals.
Under Secure Communities, only about half even got a hearing and of those only a quarter had a lawyer (compared to 41% in other immigration court proceedings). For many, this is essentially conviction for a crime without the oversight of a judge and without legal representation.
Without a lawyer, they are far more likely to be deported. Without legal counsel, some may not realize that they have a way to stay in the country, for instance through claiming asylum or if they have family who are US citizens or permanent residents. Instead, they may be pressured to voluntarily remove themselves and bypass the hearing process. It’s easy to be intimidated when you’re locked up, possibly hundreds of miles from your family, and without anyone there to give you advice except your jailers. Safe Communities will ensure that fewer people are chewed up by this extrajudicial system.
Even more egregiously, the detainers are issued for people who are suspected of being deportable, and ICE routinely gets it wrong. According to one estimate, in 2011, 1-2% of Secure Communities detainers were against US citizens. Over a few years, this amounted to approximately 3,600 citizens illegally held. Permanent residents and visa holders also have protections against arbitrary detention and deportation. Holding citizens and other legal residents like this amounts to punishment without conviction for a crime.
What’s more, local jurisdictions have been held financially liable for improperly holding people under Secure Communities, for settlements of tens of thousands of dollars. The federal government has not reimbursed them for this cost. An Oregon judge ruled that a detainer does not give local jurisdictions probable cause to hold someone. It does not have the same legal force as a warrant, which has to be reviewed by a judge. Safe Communities would protect municipalities from being sued for obeying Trump’s order.
Under 287(g), local jurisdictions enter into agreements to take on some immigration enforcement duties. In the jail-based version, it expands Secure Communities by allowing local law enforcement to determine the immigration status of those they arrest rather than waiting for a request from DHS. In Massachusetts, the Bristol and Plymouth County Sheriff’s Offices and the Department of Corrections have entered into such agreements. Trump wants to return to a task-force model, where law enforcement could act as immigration agents out in the community as well. This model was previously discontinued because it was an inefficient use of resources and encouraged racial profiling, with Latinos over-represented among those arrested.
In addition, one key principle of good policing is that the police and the communities they serve should trust each other. The police should be seen as the ones who keep us safe, not our adversaries. If they take on the duties of immigration officers, this trust will be undermined, as the undocumented will be be afraid to go to the police for fear of being deported. Information they have about crimes will go unshared. Victims will decline to report the crimes against them, and criminals will continue to walk free. This obsession with immigrants distracts from addressing the actual causes of crime and will make us less safe, not more. Indeed, there is some evidence that sanctuary jurisdictions are safer than comparable non-sanctuary jurisdictions.
Federal immigration law is the law of that land, but there is no reason that local police should be required to help. There are many federal laws that local and state police do not work to enforce, instead leaving it to federal law enforcement. Why should immigration law be any different? The Department of Homeland Security, with a budget far greater than anything at the local level, can do its own work instead of robbing badly needed resources from local authorities. Communities that have entered into 287(g) agreements have faced financial hardship because of the added immigration duties, and the added cost has come without improved public safety.
Under Safe Communities, law enforcement will continue focusing on dangerous criminals, and continue to leave immigration law enforcement to federal authorities.
Some have expressed fear about becoming a sanctuary state because of Trump’s threats to cut off federal funding in retaliation, in a transparent attempt to bully us into compliance. There is some good news on this front. It is unclear if he can legally do this, and recently some courts have ruled that he cannot, so it may be an empty threat.
Beyond this, do we want to be complicit in something we know is wrong? Do we want to help ICE break apart families and ruin lives? There is little we can do to stop federal agents from deporting people, but at least we can refuse to help. Even federal resources are limited, and by refusing to help, we can reduce the number of people who are affected, and can keep the focus on deporting dangerous criminals.
People who come here illegally not to hurt anyone, but to build a better life for themselves and their families should not be hounded as dangerous criminals for doing so. At the minimum, they should have some kind of due process protections before deportation. Draconian measures such as Trump’s planned mass deportations will tear at the very fabric of our society. They cannot not be done without egregiously violating civil rights, damaging the economy, ripping families apart, and weakening the protections that are so vital to a democracy.
Trump wants to go farther than deporting dangerous criminals: his two influential advisers who wrote the orders, Stephen Miller and Stephen Bannon, have publicly revealed that they want all immigration to this country curtailed.
Trump has a history of seeing how far he can go, of testing the reaction to his policy proposals, and then backing off to something a little more moderate when there was too strong of a backlash. During his campaign, he repeatedly made extreme policy suggestions, and when too many people got angry, he denied ever saying anything so outrageous, instead blaming the “lying media” for making up stories (despite the documented evidence to the contrary). If we give in on this, he will likely keep coming back with ever more extreme policies. It is better to resist now, rather than wait until his policies are even harsher. So far Trump has focused on terrorism and illegal immigration, but if he gets the chance he will go after legal immigrants as well. Let’s make him afraid to try.
In addition to identifying Massachusetts politicians who share common values with those of us who believe that evil corporations should be punished (and who agree with other sensible leftist ideals of that sort), the advocates at Progressive Massachusetts also have an actionable list of promising bills broken down into four categories: Infrastructure and Environment; Shared Prosperity; Racial and Social Justice; Good Government. We encourage you to check out the group’s legislator scorecard, as well as all its research at progressivemass.com. In the meantime, here’s a snapshot of the priorities for Progressive Mass in 2017. -Dig Editors
In recent years, Massachusetts has made some progress on criminal justice reform, including the legalization of marijuana, the reduction of sentences for some drug related crimes, and raising the age of juvenile jurisdiction to 18. However, the work is far from finished, so to inform us of what is at stake and about pending legislation, Progressive Watertown, Progressive Newton, Jobs Not Jails, and Watertown Citizens for Black Lives cosponsored the public forum “Why Criminal Justice Reform Matters.” It was held Saturday, May 6th, at the Belmont-Watertown United Methodist Church.
The moderator, Richard Marcus, framed the discussion by pointing out the connection between race and mass incarceration. Partly due to the war on drugs, the prison population has climbed even as the violent crime rate has dropped, and 40% of that population is black. A black baby born today has a one in three chance of someday being incarcerated. America’s original sin is racism, and its taint is far from gone.
Allen Epstein of GBIO (Greater Boston Interfaith Organization) continued this theme. Although Massachusetts has the second lowest rate of incarceration in the nation, it still has a higher rate than only ten other countries in the world. There has been a 26% drop in violent crime since 1980, yet the prison population has more than doubled, attributable to the war on drugs, racial bias, and draconian sentencing laws. African Americans are represented in the prison population at a rate two- to three-times higher than in the general population.
This harshness stands in stark contrast to his belief that all people are born good. Bad behavior is the result of a lifetime of hurts, and rehabilitation is possible. It is far better to use an approach such as restorative justice, where perpetrators, victims, and community members are brought together to achieve reconciliation and healing.
There are some grounds for hope. Criminal justice reform can be a bipartisan issue, because conservatives can also get behind it in support of fairness and cost savings. As evidence of progress, he cited the recent unanimous passage of legislation that repealed automatic driver’s license suspension for drug related convictions, and removed the $500 fee and up to 5 year delay for license reinstatement.
James Mackey shared how mass incarceration had impacted his family. On December 2, 1982 his 19 year old father was sentenced to 60 years to life in prison, and told that he would never get out. His mother was a few months pregnant with him. What did this do to his mother, having to cope with this? Later his younger brother went to prison at the age of 17. What does it do to a community to have so many missing fathers, so many missing brothers? He was six years old when he was first told he would grow up to be just like his father. If so, then that meant he should be bad, right? His brother took that message to heart and like many people around him, internalized the many troubles his neighborhood faced.
These experiences led him to form Stuck on Replay, which works to bring the voices of the people most affected by mass incarceration into the conversation about reform. As he put it, if you’re not at the table, you’re on the table. Stuck on Replay holds public forums to give people a space to talk about their experiences. It is also pushing to repeal the exception clause (also called the punishment clause) of the 13th Amendment. Because of this amendment, slavery is illegal, except as punishment for a crime. While outright slavery has been banned by the courts, prisons still use the clause to make a handsome profit off the often involuntary labor of inmates, who are paid a pittance for their work.
Caroline Bays read a compilation of two letters from an inmate she has been visiting. Andrew has been held in solitary confinement for over 6 months, and was recently sentenced to 4 years of solitary, all from one incident when he had a mental breakdown. He wrote of the psychological struggle of life in segregation. You can read it below.
Cassandra Bensahih of EPOCA (Ex-Prisoners and Prisoners Organizing for Community Advancement) shared her story of addiction and incarceration. When she was 19 years old, she nearly died from being shot by a .22 caliber rifle. In the hospital she was given pain medication, and after the pills ran out, she turned to alcohol and cocaine to numb the pain. This led to 20 years of addiction and eventually her arrest. Hers is not an uncommon story. In her community, though dealing with such violence, the effects of racism (she grew up during bus desegregation), and other traumas, there was no therapy available. Instead, people learned to push it down or self medicate. She did not get help, and with a father who was an alcoholic, the dice were loaded against her.
Her arrest did not impact only her: she is a mother. As the number of incarcerated women continues to grow (most of whom have mental health or substance abuse issues), more and more mothers and children too will face separation.
Looking back, she questioned if it had really been better for her daughters to lose the home where they were cared for and loved, though it was the home of an addict. While she was in prison, her daughters went through 17 different foster homes, where they faced emotional neglect and sexual abuse. When standing in front of the judge, she begged him to let her get help, to not be separated from her daughters. His response? You should have thought of that before you took up drugs.
As she fiercely declared, it’s wrong to think that it’s ok to lock people up, yet feel no obligation to rehabilitate them. Surely we can do better than such callous indifference. The Caregiver Bill will reform how we treat families in this situation, by providing alternatives to incarceration, such as drug treatment programs or mental health care. She imagined how different life would have been if rather than being locked up and her daughters sent to live with uncaring strangers, she had gotten help for her trauma and her addiction. Instead, recovery had to wait until prison, where a pastor taught her to pray and to free her mind even while her body was incarcerated. After her release, EPOCA found her. Simply being told that other people cared about someone like her helped her continue to recover. By working with them, she learned about leadership skills she didn’t know she had. As she noted, “People don’t heal by themselves, they heal with the help of their community.”
Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan mused that prosecutors are generally not at events like this one, but her 40 years of experience in the justice system has taught her the importance of preventing crime, rather than simply punishing it. Middlesex County has a number of innovative programs aimed at achieving just that. Childhood trauma, such as the drug overdose of a parent, is known to often lead to addiction or incarceration later on. It can start as soon as the next day, when the bereaved child returns to school and acts out. The school staff may know nothing about what is triggering the behavior, and may respond not compassionately but punitively, perhaps even setting the child on the first step of the school to prison pipeline.
Project C.A.R.E. was set up in the Lowell area to help stop such cycles of trouble. When police, fire, or EMTs find that a child is impacted by an opioid overdose, they contact the Mental Health Association of Greater Lowell, who will coordinate with DCF, mental health professionals, family members, and schools to make sure that the child gets the care they need to cope with trauma.
Middlesex County also has a number of pre-trial diversion and treatment programs for juveniles and young adults accused of a crime, as well as a restorative justice program. All of these programs reflect her conviction that when possible it is always a better remedy to provide therapy than to ensnare people in the system.
State Senator Will Brownsberger, as always, brought thoughtful insights and nuance into the discussion. He saw first hand the dangers of drugs when he lived in New York during the height of the crack epidemic–he was caught in police gun battles four separate times. Later, when blood testing became common, it was found that about 70% of those arrested had drugs in their body. Although legalization is fine for marijuana, for the harder drugs the question is more complicated, because of the very real harm they cause.
For a while he was an advocate for drug courts, where the threat of jail time would be used to force people to change–it seemed more humane than simply throwing people into prison. But when he finally began listening to addicts and others affected by these policies, he realized that incarceration was a blunt instrument. Even with drug courts, if you slip up once (which is part of the nature of addiction), you go back to prison, you lose your job and your girlfriend, and after losing all that, why not slip back into your old ways?
He noted that in the 1970s, as a nation we somehow shifted from the War on Poverty to the War on Drugs. The prison population ballooned as our sense of what was an appropriate punishment because much harsher. We know that even a single day in jail is harmful, so even a single extra day is too much.
The panelists were asked, what are their legislative priorities this year, and what are the challenges to getting these passed?
Cassandra believes the Caregiver Bill would help restore dignity to people, and give them the belief that they can make it. She also hopes to repeal mandatory minimums, which sometimes give longer punishments for low level offenses than for much more serious crimes.
Marian commented that while Middlesex County is doing well, she would like to see a restorative justice approach spread throughout the state, especially into Western Massachusetts. She noted that there was not much opposition, but there are so many bills up for consideration that it’s hard to get enough attention to get it passed.
The panelists spoke in support of several other bills. Parole and pre-trial reform are needed, because imprisoning people before trial makes it hard for them to hold onto jobs and care for their families. As Allen noted, there should be a presumption of innocence, which means not punishing people before they are convicted.
The de-Criminalization of Poverty bill would help stop the downward spiral Will mentioned, where inability to pay court fines leads to jail time, which leads to job loss, which leads to more inability to pay. It also doesn’t make fiscal sense to pay the cost of jailing someone for not paying a small fine.
The use of solitary confinement should be limited. As Will pointed out, every further loss of privileges leads to worse outcomes after release, and solitary confinement is the ultimate loss of privileges. The Department of Correction and Houses of Correction currently set much of their own policy with regards to the use of solitary confinement and other disciplinary measures. The legislature can do much more to place some limits on this (for instance, the current maximum time in solitary is 10 years).
Reform of juvenile justice was another big discussion topic. There are several measures to support, including the Juvenile Justice Omnibus Bill, diversion programs for youthful offenders, and a bill to raise the age of juvenile jurisdiction from 18 to 21. There is much to do. As James mentioned, children can be convicted of a crime at the age of seven. The audience was visibly stunned by this revelation.
Mingling youth with adults is not a good idea, because they make easy targets in prison. Will said that the biggest thing we can do for reform is to change the age of juvenile jurisdiction. Whether a defendant is classified as an adult or a juvenile makes a huge difference in how they are treated, with the juvenile system much more rehabilitation-oriented. After all, the brains of young adults are not fully matured until well into their 20s, and we don’t even allow people to rent a car until they are 25.
There is a limit to what the legislature can do. There will always be a lot of discretion in the court system, because it is simply too complex to set laws for every situation. Who is put into various positions by the governor will have a large impact. However, the legislature sets fines and other punishments, so that is where reform can happen.
The last question was “what can we do?” James mentioned an upcoming event being held by Stuck on Replay next Saturday, May 13. They will screen part of the documentary 13th, and hold a discussion on the harmful effects of the exception clause. In general, the panelists encouraged us to educate ourselves, to join organizations working to bring about change, to call our legislators, and to urge our friends and family living in other parts of the state to do the same.
Richard ended by relating an experience he had. One time he called his legislator, asking why he hadn’t visibly supported some legislation that it seemed obvious he would support. The legislator replied that Richard was the first person to call and ask him to! The lesson here is that you should still contact your legislator, even if they support the same policies as you. With a multitude of bills to consider and limited time, legislators tend to support bills only if their constituents urge them to.
The panelists and organizers deserve a big thanks for putting on this wonderful event. It will hopefully, as Cassandra put it, help us become a community of change.
Andrew’s Words:
Our Own Worst Enemy
My name is Convict. That is who I have become. I am doing a long time for a crime that I didn’t commit, but in the eyes of my captors, my name remains Convict. I have been given the unique experience of seeing first hand a world that I would have never before imagined seeing: prison.
Recent, I read a report about some changes that the department of corrections wished to implement, changes that would make the lives of convicts all the more difficult, that would make the lives of our loved ones more difficult. It is the latter of which that drove me to seek help, that woke me from the hopelessness that only loneliness knows.
I’m slowly slipping into madness. If Hell had a place on Earth, it would be called segregation. Evolved from a place of peace and quiet, segregation has become a terrible experience of psychological and physical abuse. I have seen things that no young man should ever see, experienced things that no citizen would wish upon their worst enemy, and have had an intimate relationship with a kind of utter loneliness that, in the words of Kenneth Hodge, “Should never be forced on anyone that once knew freedom.”
Violence begets violence, and suffering begets suffering; is there no end to that madness? Can one voice possibly be heard amidst the chaos? If so, then from one convict to the rest of the world, try peace over violence, for where there is one, there can be many.
“We have a fully Democratic Legislature, supermajorities. We have a governor who’s a Republican, but we have veto-proof majorities, so what’s the issue there?” said Harmony Wu, who serves on the group’s board of directors. “Something’s been missing. Many things have been missing, but one piece that we haven’t had in Massachusetts is a sustained, long-term, grassroots-organizing, citizen-advocacy push where we are speaking up with one voice saying we are tired of this way, we’d like to see leadership in this way.”
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John Kirk, a member of the group’s Needham chapter, said the lobby day is part of an effort to help the state “fulfill its progressive promise” by letting them know “the passion’s real” behind the issues.
“Since it’s a Democratic-controlled Legislature, why don’t we pass these obvious bills that everybody’s in favor of and make perfect sense? Well, we’re trying to figure that out,” said Kirk.
Governor Baker, along with the Massachusetts House Speaker DeLeo and Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court, recently announced “An Act Implementing the Recommendations of the Massachusetts Criminal Justice Review”. Sounds like it will reform criminal justice in Massachusetts, doesn’t it? Don’t be fooled by the name-it falls far short of true reform. It may even be an attempt to undercut progressive efforts to bring about real change.
The act lets inmates earn time off of their sentences if they participate in educational, vocational or rehabilitation programs, up to a reduction of 35% of the maximum term. Mandatory minimums governing opiates and crimes related to violence, illegal gun possession, or involving a minor are not eligible for sentence reductions. It also expands parole and pretrial services.
To be clear, the act is a good step and should be heartily supported. But we shouldn’t congratulate ourselves too much for taking one step when there are miles left to go.
The bill implements one recommendation of a study on criminal justice reform begun in 2015. The report was envisioned as a comprehensive study of the Commonwealth’s criminal justice system. It was supposed to identify all of its many problems and their causes, and make recommendations how to solve them. Opponents of change would no longer be able to claim, as they had for years, that the problems didn’t exist or that we didn’t understand the causes. Under its original scope, it would look at how people got entangled in the justice system, how they were treated while incarcerated, and outcomes after they were released. Instead, in an opaque back room process, the focus of the study became on only the last part, namely how to reduce recidivism. The rest was deliberately ignored, perhaps as a tactic to delay further action.
Still, the report made valuable recommendations on how to tackle this important issue, including:
sentence reductions for completing anti-recidivism programs and better monitoring of the performance of such programs
making the parole process more efficient (it typically takes an outrageous 200 days between being awarded parole and actually getting released)
more community supervision and behavioral health care for parolees.
Out of the many recommendations, Baker’s act only implements a few of them.
Reducing recidivism is a worthy goal and absolutely should be supported, but it entirely ignores many other vital issues. Criminal justice in Massachusetts is actually fairly harsh, especially for a state that prides itself on being progressive. Did you know you can lose your driver’s license for many offenses completely unrelated to driving, including failure to appear in court, nonpayment of child support, even graffiti? Did you know you can be held in solitary confinement for up to a decade?
There are many other problems waiting to be addressed: mandatory minimums awarding excessively harsh sentences, the struggle of anyone with a criminal record to get a job, racial profiling, police violence, the school to prison pipeline, overuse of solitary confinement, harsh sentences for juvenile offenders… the list goes on. Surely such a supposedly blue state can do better.
The governor’s bill will help with a few issues-it will help lower recidivism, reduce sentences for some prisoners, and by releasing people early it will reduce the prison population and spending on prisons. That’s all good, but it isn’t enough.
It only deals with people who are already incarcerated. This does nothing to prevent people from entering the system to begin with, and ignores the troubling racial disparities in incarceration rates.
Bottom line, mandatory minimums need to go, and the bill is not a replacement for repeal. The harsher sentences from mandatory minimums mean that more people are in prison than need to be, robbing them of parts of their lives and costing taxpayers extra money. Allowing early release for some inmates still leaves them fully in place for people convicted of some drug offenses and other crimes. Beyond that, mandatory minimums rob judges of the discretion to take mitigating circumstances into consideration. Even the fear of receiving a long sentence because of a mandatory minimum helps prosecutors pressure defendants into accepting harsher sentences than they would otherwise get. This may make the prosecutor’s job easier but it does not serve justice.
Another major sticking point with the bill is the requirement that inmates participate in education and rehabilitation programs to qualify for sentence reductions. There is nothing wrong with this idea, but it depends on programming being available, and such programs are often the first to be cut if there is fiscal tightening. In the long term, funding for such programs will come and go as the political winds shift, and when the funding goes, those minimums will once again trap inmates in prison for longer than necessary.
In addition to the Justice Reinvestment Act, which is a comprehensive reform bill, there are a number of related bills that tackle criminal justice. Together, they will:
reduce sentences and remove mandatory minimums for nonviolent drug crimes
restore judicial discretion in sentencing
increase the use of parole and post release supervision
expand educational programming, both within and before prison
reduce court fees and prevent someone from going to prison if they can’t pay the fees
expand the use of treatment for drug related crimes
reform juvenile justice
limit the use of solitary confinement
reduce racial profiling by requiring reporting of data on who the police stop, and why they are stopped
require police to wear body cameras
root out the underlying causes of crime by allowing funding for community youth and jobs programs.
That is what true criminal justice reform looks like. Compared to that, the governor’s bill is pretty unimpressive.
Instead of doing the hard work of building support for true reform they have simply picked one modest and politically easy measure to wrap up, put a bow on it and say that they given us “Criminal Justice Reform”. Sorry kids, this birthday gift is sure to disappoint. Let’s keep the pressure on for real reform.
You can learn more by coming to Progressive Watertown’s event next Saturday, May 6, “Why Criminal Justice Reform Matters”. It will feature a panel discussion by one of the sponsors of the Justice Reinvestment Act, Representative Will Brownsberger, the Middlesex County District Attorney Marian Ryan, and other experts.
