A new legal force launched by TimeBanks USA aims to bring the ineffective and expensive rote practice of sending minority youth to confinement to a screeching halt. Using a new legal strategy making it easier to prove intent to discriminate, the TimeBanks Racial Justice Initiative will begin putting judges and their communities on formal notice of the injuries resulting from juvenile confinement practices and of much more effective and affordable alternatives.
What leaders are saying about the TimeBanks USA Racial Justice Initiative:
James Bell, Founder and Executive Director, W. Haywood Burns Institute
“It is wonderful to have creative minds developing innovative legal theories to challenge the most important issue in our justice systems today. Making jurisdictions liable for being deliberately indifferent to their over-representation of youth of color would be a true revolution in the field.”
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Shirley Marcus Allen, Partner, Venture Philanthropy Partners
“Our children are our future! The extent to which local communities are able and willing to execute effective remedies to address racial disparities in juvenile justice and child welfare will determine the true meaning of ‘future’ for all of us!
“This initiative matters to me because I’m ‘sick and tired’ of being ‘sick and tired’ of giving lip service to changing child welfare and juvenile justice practice. We’ve been at this now for over 30 years. Our children have become commodities. We know what works and we owe it to our children, and ourselves, to stop the intellectual discourse and implement community-based, culturally competent interventions that change the trajectory for all children.
“Now that the Initiative is available in the field it is my hope and prayer that voice will be given to the development of a broad-based community engagement strategy that truly engages the community in decision making for children and youth in the juvenile justice and child welfare system.”
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Charles Ogletree, Jesse Climenko Professor of Law and Director of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice, Harvard Law School
www.charleshamiltonhouston.org
“On behalf of myself and the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute, I applaud the work Edgar Cahn and Cynthia Robbins, organizers of the TimeBanks USA Racial Justice Initiative. Their efforts are not only consistent with the work of our Institute but are fitting legacy of the work of Charles Hamilton Houston himself, who taught us all the wisdom of well-crafted legal strategies for eliminating injustice… I look forward to finding creative opportunities to contribute to and benefit from the effort to craft strategies that will dismantle the system of inequity facing our young people today.”
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Reg Weaver, immediate past President, National Education Association and currently Vice President of the North American Caribbean Region of Education International
“If we know there are better ways to help youth get back on track and improve public safety, it is our national responsibility to do it,” said Reg Weaver. “Our nation’s teachers see firsthand the potential that exists in each child, but some kids need more support and direction. We look forward to the national movement the Racial Justice Initiative will unleash to finally end the squandering of precious resources in our juvenile justice system as well as helping to put an end to racial discrimination.”
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