San Quentin News

Written By Incarcerated - Advancing Social Justice

Princeton students support ex-cons getting higher education

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“Formerly incarcerated applicants are among the most vulnerable, and we should treat them with respect, if not admiration”

Princeton University has taken a stance against a student movement called “Ban the Box.” The “box” refers to a section of the college admissions application that inquires about a prospective student’s criminal history. Applicants with criminal histories are very likely to be rejected from academic institutions. Students argue that by allowing criminal histories to weigh into admissions decisions, the Princeton administration is perpetuating inequality and is unfairly denying the formerly incarcerated second chances. Higher education is also an important contributor to decreasing recidivism.

During a meeting held at the Council of the Princeton University Community, a mixture of opinions emerged regarding how exoffender applicants should be treated.

Some, including many students, thought that once a person has served his or her time, he or she should be able to regain all the rights of full citizenship.

Some, representatives of Princeton expressed their opposition.“I think there are some kinds of criminal activity that may be related to risks that could occur on campus,” said Christopher Eisgruber, President of Princeton University. “We take those risks seriously.”

“I think there are some kinds of criminal activity that may be related to risks that could occur on campus”

Samuel Aftel, a Princeton University student, expressed frustration at the university’s reasoning for maintaining the box. He said that accord- ing to the university’s logic, a former convict will be more likely to commit violence outside FitzRandolph Gate than on campus. Princeton claims to protect its campus community above all else. Some say that the university is okay with the violence as long as it happens outside its campus gates.

“We take those risks seriously”

There is limited research on the potential impacts of banning the box and no hard data suggests a formerly incarcerated person will endanger other students. Some feel that to deny a person’s civil liberties after incarceration is to essentially keep that person incarcerated after his or her release.

“Formerly incarcerated applicants are among the most vulnerable, and we should treat them with respect, if not admiration,” says Aftel.

Reintegraciόn y trabajo dificil para Ex-Convictos

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CTE laborers on the work site

CTE laborers on the work site

Ex convictos continúan siendo estigmatizados por su historial criminal, en particular al intentar buscar un trabajo legítimo. Sin embargo, los empresarios están enfrentando una creciente presión a nivel nacional para cambiar sus pólizas de no ofrecer empleo a ex convictos.

Una vez que un preso se reintegra a la sociedad, encontrar y mantener un empleo se convierte en el principal factor que determina sí un preso tiene éxito o  regresar a la prisión.  El movimiento “Ban the box” buscar revocar las pregunta de “si” o “no” a cerca de felonías previas en las solicitudes de empleo, de acuerdo a un reciente artículo del Inside Sources.

“Cualquier dictamen de culpabilidad por alguna actividad criminal llega a ser una sentencia de desempleo de por vida para mucho individuos,” escribió Arthur Rizer y Rachel Liebman en un artículo sobre éste tema. “Ese ciclo destructivo tiene que cambiar, y los negocios desempeñan un papel fundamental.”

Aproximadamente un tercio de los americanos tienen registros criminales. Asimismo el 95% de los 2.3 millones de personas que se encuentran encarceladas, eventualmente obtendrán su libertad y se incorporarán a la sociedad.

“No podemos darnos el lujo de hacer a un lado a éste inmenso potencial humano…éstos ex convictos estarán caminando las calles de un país que, en gran medida, les ha cerrado las puertas de las oportunidades económicas, destinando a muchos a un ciclo de crimen, pobreza y vagabundez, según el artículo.

“En una economía fuerte, debería haber lugar para todos los que quieran y puedan contribuir con su talento y trabajo”

Prisoners working in the hobby craft building

Cerca del 60% de los ex convictos se encuentran sin trabajo después de un año de ser liberados y aquellos que tienen empleo, reciben un pago que es 40%  inferior con relación a las personas que no tienen un record criminal.

Debido a que un tercio de todos los trabajos en los Estados Unidos exigen algún tipo de licencia profesional o certificación, una inspección rutinaria del historial criminal impide que ex convictos califiquen para esas clases de empleos- aún cuando el trabajo no requiera esa inspección como medida de seguridad pública.

“Pero hay esperanza para un mejor camino,” de acuerdo al artículo. “…Veintinueve estados y 150 jurisdicciones han implementado las pólizas de prohibición de la caja (ban-the-box) que únicamente detiene a  los empresarios –en la mayoría de los casos empleadores públicos –de  realizar preguntas acerca del historial delictivo hasta después que se le haya otorgado un empleo a la persona.”

“Muchos dueños de empresas todavía dependen en información discriminatoria biométrica, tales como huellas digitales y verificación de antecedentes,” escribió el autor. Tales métodos no toman en consideración que la información puede ser inexacta, incompleta o  anticuada;  tampoco considera los factores mitigantes de la ofensa, la edad en la que se cometió el crimen o el número de años que han pasado después de la ofensa.

“En una economía fuerte debería haber lugar para todos los que quieran y puedan contribuir con su trabajo y talento, “concluyó el artículo. “Ninguna persona que haya cumplido con su sentencia debería servir una sentencia de desempleo de por vida.”

  –Traduccion por Tare Beltranchuc Y Marco Villa                                                                                                                                           

Several new policies to help hire formerly incarcerated

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Titan Gilroy demonstrating to students how an edge finder works

In spite of the negative stigma of a felony conviction, new policies developed by local, state and federal officials will encourage employers to hire the formerly incarcerated, according to a Rand Corporation report.

Policies such as “Ban the Box,” certificates of rehabilitation, the federal Work Opportunity Tax Credit (WOTC) and Department of Labor Reintegration of Ex-Offender grants, even with  limitations, improve the chances of the formerly incarcerated for employment, the Rand study found.

“To inform policies and programs aimed at improving employment rates for ex-offenders, we conducted experiments to examine employer preferences regarding policy options targeted to incentivizing the employment of individuals with felony criminal records,” Rand stated.

According to the Rand study, there are several theories that attempt to explain the “consistent negative relationship” between the formerly incarcerated and employers, which results in poor labor market success for many of those with criminal records.

“Employers’ primary concerns are violent convictions and low skills,” according to the Rand study.

Having a criminal record is associated with low productivity and reliability, it was reported. This, according to Rand, explains why ex-offenders receive fewer job offers and earn less money.

“There are two sets of economic discrimination theories to explain why firms choose not to hire ex-offenders even when they possess the necessary skills for a job,” Rand reported. First, “employers worry that their clients or employees associate ex-offender status with being a high-risk worker.” Second, “employers cannot be certain about the productivity levels of prospective workers.”

The Rand study focused on policies designed to ease employer concerns by offsetting “actual or perceived costs of employing an ex-offender.” For example, in 1996 the federal tax code made available a credit to for-profit companies that employ groups that face certain barriers to entry in the job market, including “ex-felons.”

Another way to increase employment opportunities for ex-felons is the “Ban the Box” (BTB) policy that limits the use of an applicant’s criminal history by employers when making hiring decisions.

“There are over 4,800 legal restrictions facing people with convictions  after sentence completion…73% of these legal barriers are permanent.”

“SAFE AND SOUND: …” by Californians For Safety and Justice Nov. 2017

“By delaying employers’ ability to use a job applicant’s criminal history as a signal of low employability, BTB policies aim to encourage ex-offenders to apply for positions,” Rand reported.

A certificate of rehabilitation can also be used as an incentive for employers to hire the formally incarcerated. According Rand, “a certificate of rehabilitation (CoR) is a judicial order in which, typically, a court determines that an individual has shown exemplary behavior and declares them judicially rehabilitated.” Eleven states, including California, provide some form of this certificate.

Because an ex-offender’s loss of driving privilege can negatively affect an employer’s decision to hire them, some employment and training programs for ex-offenders include a transportation component, the Rand study says, adding also that “auto ownership has been shown to increase employment rates.”

“To identify policies that could increase employment rates of workers with criminal records, we conducted two policy experiments using a survey-based, modified-discrete choice experiment approach,” Rand reported.

Rand chose a tax credit and a private staffing agency to test employers’ preferences within its experimental hiring design.

“While the policy features studied in the experiments are largely hypothetical, they are based on the federal WOTC; local and state BTB laws; services of probation, parole, and re-entry programs; and services of employment or staffing agencies,” the study stated.

Some results from the study indicate that employers that used the baseline staffing agency would forward a candidate with the necessary skills and a nonviolent felony conviction to the next round of recruitment 42.9 percent of the time.

It was reported that seven out of 10 employers “would consider hiring a candidate if, in addition to the baseline package, there was also a guaranteed replacement worker program (65.6 percent) or a certified work performance history.”

Other results show that if an ex-felon job candidate with the required skills and a nonviolent felony conviction was supported by a tax credit, about six out of 10 employers would forward the candidate on to the next level of recruitment.

Lastly, “approximately five to six out of 10 employers said they would forward the candidate on to the next recruitment round if they had secure, consistent transportation,” Rand reported, adding finally that  “the candidate with validated work performance is 24.4 percent more likely to be considered for a job than the other candidate.”

www.rand.org/t/RR2142

http://sanquentinnews.com/job-fair-sponsored-by-trust-program/
http://sanquentinnews.com/prison-employment-connection-holds-job-readiness-event/

Parolees’ hard transition from stigmatized past

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Convicted felons continue to be stigmatized by their criminal past, particularly when they search for legitimate work. But employers are facing a growing, nationwide pressure to change their anti-felon hiring policies.

Upon reentry, finding and maintaining employment becomes the main factor that determines an inmate’s success or recidivism. The “ban the box” movement seeks to abolish the yes or no question about felony conviction on standard job applications, according to a recent article.

Intimate partner violence accounts for 15 percent of all violent crime. One in three women and one in four men in the United States has experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner. Husbands are five times more likely to kill wives than vice versa. A third of female homicide victims are killed by an intimate male partner or ex-partner, according to FBI reports. http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/ndv0312.pdf

“Any sentence for criminal activity will, for many, ultimately become a life sentence of under- or unemployment,” wrote Arthur Rizer and Rachel Liebman in an article on the issue. “That destructive cycle needs to change, and businesses have a big role to play.”

Nearly one-third of Americans have criminal red flags on their jackets; and 95 percent of the 2.3 million people currently incarcerated will eventually be released into society.

“We cannot afford to toss aside this vast human potential.…These millions of former inmates will hit the streets of a country that has, for the most part, locked them out of economic opportunities, consigning many to a cycle of homelessness, crime and poverty,”  according to the article.

“In a strong economy, there should be room for everyone who wants to and can contribute work and talent”

Almost 60 percent of formerly incarcerated individuals are unemployed a year after their release, while those who do sustain employment are paid on average 40 percent less than persons without any criminal record.

Because one-third of all U.S. jobs require some type of professional license or certification, routine background checks prevent ex-offenders from being qualified for such work—even when the job does not entail any public safety considerations.

“But there is hope for a better path,” according to the article. “…Twenty-nine states and 150 jurisdictions have implemented ban-the-box policies that delay employers—in most cases, just public employers—from asking about criminal convictions until a conditional offer of employment has been extended.”

“Too many employers still rely on discriminatory biometric information, like fingerprints and name-based background checks,” the authors wrote. Such methods fail to take into account inaccurate, outdated or incomplete data, any mitigating factors surrounding the offense, the age at which the crime was committed or the number of years since the offense.

“In a strong economy, there should be room for everyone who wants to and can contribute work and talent,” the article concluded.  “…No one who has served their time should be expected to automatically serve a ‘life sentence’ of unemployment.”

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Study reveals how ‘Ban the Box’ can do more harm than good

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“‘Ban the Box’ Does More Harm than Good,” an op-ed by Jennifer L. Doleac and published by the Brookings Institution, says that the policy that’s supposed to help ex-offenders find jobs doesn’t really help many. It actually winds up hurting the employment chances for Black and Hispanic men who don’t have criminal records.

Doleac reports that Black men born in 2001 have a 32 percent chance of imprisonment, Hispanic men have a 17 percent chance, and White men have only a 6 percent chance. Employers often assume, therefore, that Black and Hispanic men have a greater chance of having been in prison and, as a result, are probably less job-ready.

Ex-offenders have it tough because it is difficult for those with criminal records to find jobs. Most employers won’t even give ex-offenders an opportunity for an interview, let alone accept their applications, according to the article.

Doleac reports that two researchers, Amanda Agan and Sonja Starr, wanted to study how “ban the box” would affect job applicants’ chances. They sent thousands of fake job applications to employers in New Jersey and New York City, where “ban the box” is in effect. Though employers call White applicants slightly more often than Black applicants when criminal records have been disclosed, that gap becomes four times larger when “ban the box” is in effect. That bigger gap is an unintended side effect of the policy.

Stated another way, the unintended side effect is that the people who gained the most from “ban the box” were White applicants with criminal records. 

In a different study, Doleac reports, she and Benjamin Hansen measured the effects of “ban the box” on young, low-skilled men across the country. Their results showed that Black and Hispanic men who did not have college degrees were employed significantly less under “ban the box” than before.

Doleac ends by suggesting that because “ban the box” has had such counterproductive consequences, concentrating efforts on helping disadvantaged ex-offenders improve their job readiness would be more effective and most helpful to ex-offenders.

 

Legislation seeks to overturn law barring ex-offenders from obtaining professional licenses

‘Ban the Box’ Movement Is Gaining Traction

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Several new policies to help hire formerly incarcerated

‘Ban the Box’ Might Have Unintended Consequences

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A recent study shows two-thirds of former inmates are rearrested and re-convicted within three years of their release from prison, reports Kate Irby for McClatchy.
A staggering 60 to 75 percent are not employed a year after their release.
People who can’t earn money often use illegal means to survive. Moreover, efforts to fix the problem may unintentionally complicate the matter for those who have never committed crime, according to the report.
A new policy called “Ban the Box” was created to remedy the problem. However, a Princeton study shows the law benefits Whites more than Blacks and Hispanics.
Ban the Box legislation has been adopted by many cities and states and in 2015 was applied to federal employers by President Barack Obama. It prevents employers from including a box on applications for potential employees to check if they were convicted of a crime. It deters questions about criminal history until “late in the hiring process.”
The law was designed to empower parolees to prove their employability and lessen the likelihood of employers to toss convicts’ applications due to their convictions. The ideology behind this law is to decrease recidivism rates, according to the report.
However, according to McClatchy, it has unintended negative consequence, creating biased hiring practices for Blacks and Hispanics, even for those Blacks and Hispanics who have not been convicted of a crime.
A study done by Princeton researchers of fictitious job applications submitted to employers in New Jersey and New York prior to the enactment of the ban the box policy tracked how many responses these applications received. The applications had randomly assigned race and criminal backgrounds. The total New York numbers were incomplete, but the New Jersey results were startling as to how employers reacted once the ban the box policy became law.
Employers who required criminal history background checks on a job application called White people back slightly more often prior to the laws enactment, but the gap dramatically increased after employers were forbidden to ask about criminal history.
Jennifer L. Doleac of the Brookings Institution said, this discrimination comes up because employers are trying to use extremely limited information in a job application to find people who would be “peaceful, honest, agreeable employees who won’t be taken off the job by an arrest or conviction.” Most employers do that partially by checking criminal backgrounds, even though some former convicts are perfectly capable of fitting that mold. But without that check, they turn to another, even less accurate indicator: race.
“Black and Hispanic men are more likely than others to have been convicted of a crime: the most recent data suggests that a Black man born in 2001 has a 32 percent chance of serving time in prison at some point during his lifetime, compared with 17 percent for Hispanic men and just 6 percent for White men,” says Doleac. “Employers will guess that Black and Hispanic men are more likely to have been in prison and therefore less likely to be job-ready.”
Doleac concludes that ban the box policy hurts more people than it helps: “Just because employers can’t see an applicant’s criminal history doesn’t mean they don’t care about it,” says Doleac. “Under ban the box, they will avoid ex-offenders by avoiding groups that are more likely to contain ex-offenders, like Black and Hispanic men.”

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Ban the Box Underway Across The Country

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The “Ban the Box” movement is gaining support across the country, boosting the chance of people with criminal records to get jobs, a report says.
Twenty-three states and more than 100 cities and counties nationwide have adopted some form of “Ban the Box,” which prohibits a question on whether the job applicant has a criminal record, according to the National Employment Law Project.
California adopted its initiative in 2013, when Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown signed Assembly Bill 218. It removes the questions about convictions from initial state, city and county job applications.
That allows an employer to consider a job candidate’s qualifications first, without the stigma of a criminal record, according to the March 2016 report.
San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously passed the Fair Chance Ordinance in February 2014 after a three-year campaign by multiple human rights and civil rights groups. Most notable was the group “All or None,” which has been a driving force in multiple cities and counties.
The ordinance applies to private employers and affordable housing. It incorporated the 2012 U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission criteria for individualized assessment and the right to appeal denial of employment.
The commission also set a guideline on targeted hiring and fair-chance employment laws that require employers to consider job-relatedness of a conviction, time passed, and mitigating circumstances or rehabilitation evidence, the report stated.
At an event in Oakland, business owners and potential employers discussed the benefits of hiring people with records and re-entry issues.
“I’ve seen how a job makes all the difference,” the report quotes Derreck B. Johnson, founder and president of Home of Chicken and Waffles in Oakland. “When I give someone a chance and he becomes my best employee, I know that I’m doing right by my community.”
The city of Oakland improved its policy in 2010, where the city would notify the applicant of the potential adverse employment action and provide a copy of the background report. It also provides the applicant an opportunity to rebut the accuracy or relevancy of the background report.
Other California counties that have passed a “Ban the Box” law are Alameda and Santa Clara. Cities are Berkeley, Carson, Compton, East Palo Alto, Pasadena and Richmond.
“We should have a fair shake if we are the right person for the job,” San Quentin prisoner Tommy Wickerd said in an interview. “If I fit the criteria to be back in society, a felony shouldn’t hold me back”
Another prisoner, Bo Gentry, said, “People should be judged by their character and not their past. What is behind should not be in front of you.”

‘Ban the Box’ Movement Gains National Traction

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Efforts are underway to help former prisoners find jobs. The focus is to “ban the box” on job applications that would disclose any criminal convictions.
Tamisha Walker recalls her first encounter with the box.
“Right then and there, it was like the air went out of my tires,” Walker told reporter Lydia DePillis, who was writing for the Washington Post’s online feature Storyline.
Walker said she got an interview but didn’t get that job; however, she did get another job as a community organizer.
Since then, Walker has helped pass a law in the city of Richmond that bans city government and its contractors from asking about criminal history on initial job applications.
Soon after, California passed a law requiring state agencies to delay asking the question until after determining the applicant meets the basic requirements of a job.
“Meanwhile, the ‘ban the box’ movement was sweeping the country,” DePillis reported. “Since Hawaii became the first jurisdiction to protect the employment prospects of people with criminal records in 1998, 12 more states and 97 cities and counties have passed some version of ‘fair chance’ hiring.”
In September Walker attended a White House meeting to urge the federal government to take similar action. A number of community-based organizations have joined the effort, asking President Obama to “ban the box” for federal agencies and their contractors.
“Now is the time for President Obama to act boldly to open up employment opportunities for the large numbers of Americans who have been unfairly locked out of the job market because of a criminal record,” says a report drafted by the National Employment Law Project.
DePillis is described as a reporter focusing on labor, business and housing. She worked previously at The New Republic and the Washington City Paper.

Richmond City Passes New ‘Ban-the-Box’ Law, 6 to 1

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A law prohibiting employers from asking job applicants to disclose their criminal background during any point in the hiring process was passed, 6-1, by the Richmond City Council recently. It is among the nation’s most comprehensive “ban-the-box” laws, according to an article in the Huffington Post. The “box” in question is the place on applications where applicants often must check that they have a criminal background.
Several dozen municipalities across the country, including Oakland, have enacted similar legislation. Richmond’s ordinance exempts job seekers from disclosing a criminal background either during interviews or after they are hired.

“We’re going to have a lot of folks coming

back from incarceration and looking

for work here soon”

Councilwoman Jovanka Beckles, who introduced the legislation, told the Post, “We’ve really taken it up a notch. By introducing one of the most comprehensive plans in the country, our hope is to reduce unemployment and recidivism in Richmond and give these people who want to, a chance to make a change.”
Beckles noted the timeliness of the ordinance, especially as California braces for the impact of Assembly Bill 109, a bill aimed at reducing prison overcrowding by redirecting low-level offenders back to their counties of commitment.
“We’re going to have a lot of folks coming back from incarceration and looking for work here soon,” she said.
The ordinance makes an exception for “sensitive” jobs, including employment working with children and the elderly or positions in law enforcement.
Advocates of ban-the-box laws say it helps give people with criminal backgrounds a chance to rejoin the workforce and make a positive impact on society.
“Once we pay our debt, I think the playing field should be fair,” former inmate Andres Abarra, who served 16 months for selling heroin, told The Wall Street Journal. Abarra was fired from his first job out of prison after a background check.
The practice is not uncommon, according to Linda Evans, an organizer with Legal Services for Prisoners with Children. “We believe, and we know from speaking with employers, that many times if someone checks the box ‘yes, I have a past conviction,’ that application is thrown in the garbage,” Evans said in a You Tube video.
“We try to point out to the employers that there are many highly qualified people who have had some kind of interaction with the law who would be an asset to their employment pool.”
Councilman Tom Butt, the lone dissenter on the council vote, told the Richmond Pulse that he agrees with the sentiment of ban-the-box, but that the Richmond ordinance goes too far. “This Richmond ordinance pushes it way beyond what was done before, and employers should have discretion.”
Detractors lament the ban-the-box laws, saying it puts employers in a possibly dangerous position. “We have the responsibility to protect our customers, protect other employees and then the company itself,” said Kelly Knott, of the National Retail Federation.
The Office of Neighborhood Safety [https://www.ci.richmond.ca.us/271/Office-of-Neighborhood-Safety] techniques involve street outreach and transformative travel. ONS seeks out young men who are active firearm offenders to present credible alternatives to violence.

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