FIERCE: Building the leadership and power of LGBTQ youth of color; addressing the criminalization of poor, young queers of color in gentrifying areas in NYC by bringing those voices into the center of discussion about planning and safety.
But there also are a few systemic changes that could help enormously.
Nancy A. Heitzeg: During the past 40 years there has been a dramatic escalation the U.S. prison population, a ten-fold increase since 1970. The rate of incarceration for women escalated at an even more dramatic pace. The increased rate of incarceration can be traced almost exclusively to the War on Drugs and the rise of lengthy mandatory minimum prison sentences for drug crimes and other non violent felonies. It is important to note that 75% of all those imprisoned are incarcerated for a non-violent offense.
These harsh policies have proliferated, not in response to crime rates nor any empirical data that indicates their effectiveness,. They have proliferated due to our unfounded fears and the profit motive that is increasingly wound up with the prison system.
The most immediate practical solution is decriminalization of a multitude of lesser and "victimless" offenses and a wholesale return to community corrections probation, restitution and community service.. Prior to mandatory minimum sentences, these were the primary sentencing options for non-violent offenders. Probation has been used effectively for over 100 years. Community alternatives have long been associated with both much lower costs than incarceration and higher "success" rates as measured by lower recidivism rates. It costs an average of $ 25000 per inmate per year local state fed nearly $150 billion per year and the average execution costs an average of $2 million dollars..Comparatively community correctional options have one-third of the costs and twice the success rate.
In addition to these well-tried traditional methods, there is also a move to consider restorative justice models. In the context of the community and presented as true alternative to other criminal sanctions, restorative justice models offer a method for actually addressing and repairing torn community relations
There are also international examples we can learn from. Decriminalization of drugs and other lesser offenses reduces stress on legal systems and removes an entire class of offenders form legal control. Prisons are used rarely and sentence lengths are much shorter. Perhaps the best example of how prisons may serve a rehabilitative and reintegrative purpose is Norway's new Halden Fengsel prison, described as the most humane prison in the world.
There are many options available to us other than prison and certainly many uses of prison that are less draconian than those offered in the United States. We merely lack the will to change.
A3N: What examples of organizing against the PIC do you find most inspiring?
KW: The struggle for abolition would not be
gaining the ground it is without the vision and relentless persistence
of Critical Resistance
and INCITE! Women of Color
Against Violence Other groups such as the Institute for Community
Justice are taking on the challenges of community-led solutions to
the crisis of mass incarceration.
I also have a special love for groups that have a genius for
refusing to get caught in the "single issue" trap that characterizes
much of nonprofit work today by building strong bridges to the challenge
of resisting the prison industrial complex. They prove that a single
issue is an entry way to cross-issue, cross-constituency movement
building. In addition to those groups already named earlier, the groups
that most inspire me are:
The Sylvia Rivera Law Project
Queers for Economic Justice
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