Integrated Justice Alliance

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We Did It!

WE DID IT!!!!

Here are the bills that have made it through both houses and were signed by the Governor on January 18, 2010! Congratulations!! These bills are reflection of your collective voice:

1) Strengthening Women and Families Act: A4197 and S1347
• Lifts...

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IJA SPEAKS OUT ABOUT LAWS UNDER FIRE

To the Editor of the Trenton Times:

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Policy Areas

  • Racial and Economic Disparities
    Addressing civil/human rights issues for youth and adults involved with the criminal justice system. One of our first issues that we attacked in New Jersey is Prison Based Gerrymandering. Watch the videos below to see why we're opposed to this practice.
  • Prison Policies and Conditions
    Monitoring correctional systems to ensure that they fulfill their mandate to provide public safety, care, and custody, in ways that are humane, responsive, respectful, and just.
  • Non-Prison Responses to Crime
    Creating less expensive, more effective ways to deal with criminal behavior.
  • Reintegration
    Making internal and external connections to personal and social resources during incarceration and after release by providing incentives for success that allow formerly incarcerated people to become an integral part of the community.

2011 Agenda

  • The establishment of an independent oversight board
    Following the example of NY and PA, IJA is working on establishing a “legislative standing committee on corrections” that would empower a non-governmental, independent, monitoring commission with rights of access to the facilities
  • Fiscal and racial impact statements
    At the urging of the Sentencing Project, these statements would be required to accompany any new laws dealing with CJ
  • Ban the Box
    Unpacking the earlier “Post-release Employment Act” that didn’t pass in 2010
  • Prison-based gerrymandering
    Especially important during legislative redistricting attempting to have people in prison counted in the Census as residents in their home communities and not in the districts where the prisons are located. IJA is talking with members of the Apportionment Commission about counting people in prison “at large” during redistricting. Further encouraging legislation to be written and passed that will affect the way people are counted in 2020.

Core Organizations

Become a Signatory

In addition to the core organizations, there are thirty organizations that have expressed interest in being "signatories" of the Alliance and involved in on-going criminal justice reform work that is part of the Integrated Justice Alliance Initiative. Become a signatory

Blog

media

Resources

  • It's time to start winning the War on Drugs
    It's time to start winning the War on Drugs By New Jersey State Senator Raymond Lesniak It's time to start winning the War on Drugs. Since the inception of the War on Drugs, New Jersey's prison population has increased from 5,886 in 1980 to 25,436 in 2009. 80% of these prison inmates have substance abuse addictions and nearly 60% are re-arrested within two years of release from prison. Clearly, we are losing the War on Drugs.
  • Counting the Costs Prisoner Transcripts
    Counting the Costs Prisoner Transcripts Now Online!
  • Vera Institute of Justice: The continuing fiscal crisis in corrections
    ABOUT This page shows corrections appropriations in 44 states for fiscal years 2010 and 2011. You can view those states’ corrections allocations and recent changes in funding sources, including stimulus monies from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).
  • Strategies That Improve Employment Outcomes and Increase Public Safety
    Justice Center Research A Sneak Peek: Advice for State Policymakers on Designing Strategies That Improve Employment Outcomes and Increase Public Safety
  • Mass Incarceration in America
    http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/americanprospect/20110102specialreport/i...
  • Justice Policy Institute - Early Release Program
    For Immediate Release: How to safely reduce prison populations and support people returning to their communities June 2010 The current economic situation is causing many states to face difficult budget choices. Policymakers across the country are realizing that the expense of incarcerating so many people—states spent $52 billion on corrections in FY2008—is reducing resources available for investments in social structures, like education and healthcare. As a result, many states are developing new and innovative ways to trim their prison populations,