By Nyesha Stone We all know our state fails in lot of areas, and the ones we do succeed in aren’t usually ones worth bragging about. As the most segregated city in the country—according to a recent study by the Brookings Institution—Wisconsin is also surpassing the country when it comes to the number of probations […]
Prison Phone Rates Generate Billions for Companies – and Cause Stress for Black Families
by Curtis Bunn Urban News Service Garry Lawrence’s family worried about paying his legal fees. But phoning him in prison nearly bankrupted them. When Garry was arrested almost seven years ago on a minor drug offense, his loved ones knew that paying a lawyer to argue his case would be a major expense. They were […]
Could Big Data Reduce The Prison Population?
Technology Could Prove As Important As Legislation by Eric Easter Urban News Service Better use of technology and data could help solve the problem of mass incarceration. That’s one conclusion that can be drawn from the work of Steven Matthews, a technology consultant who, until recently, was Chief Information Officer for the Illinois Department of […]
Soaring Costs, Social-Science Data Drive Slash in State Prison Populations
By Nick Chiles Urban News Service As Earth’s most prolific jailer, America faces a thorny question: What do you do with millions of inmates when they return home? That challenge is at the heart of many bipartisan prison reforms that are sweeping the nation. Georgia recently tackled this issue. The staunchly Republican state has become […]
Obama: Prison Reform Needed – President Strong in NAACP Speech
By Stacy M. Brown July 24, 2015 Stacy M. Brown is Special to the NNPA from The Washington Informer. Even before his keynote address in front of a cheering crowd at the annual NAACP convention in Philadelphia on Tuesday, President Barack Obama was busy practicing what he had already prepared […]