Civil Rights Strategic Agenda, June 2022
The Austin/Travis County Reentry Roundtable, in partnership with the City of Austin and Travis County, has developed a strategic agenda with the goal of ensuring civil rights for persons with criminal backgrounds as measured through increased rates of housing stability and employment. The strategic agenda can be read here.
The Reentry Roundtable Civil Rights Strategic Agenda Work Group developed three goals: Advocate for local legislative and administrative policy changes related to fair chance housing and hiring; Partner with State-Level Organizations to impact state policy changes related to fair chance housing and hiring; and Educate employers and housing providers to reduce stigma. Each goal is described by strategies with success measures and potential partners. These goals were informed by a series of listening sessions on the intersections of reentry and housing, homelessness, and employment. Listening Session summaries available here.
The following stakeholders comprised Reentry Roundtable’s Civil Rights Strategic Agenda work group: Jacquelyn Alexander (City of Austin Office of Civil Rights), Amanda Cassidy (Reentry Roundtable Advocacy Fellowship), Sherisa Davis-Larry (City of Austin Office of Civil Rights), Helen Gaebler (UT Austin School of Law), Carol Johnson (City of Austin Office of Civil Rights), Cathy McClaugherty (Travis County Justice & Public Safety), Christy Moffett (Travis County Economic Development & Strategic Investments), Selena Munoz (Travis County Economic Development & Strategic Investments), Hank Perret (Community Representative), Octavio Ulloa (Travis County Health & Human Services), Peter Valdez (City of Austin Downtown Austin Community Court). Madeleine Jordan-Lord and Kelly Nichols (Woollard Nichols & Associates) provided support for the work group.
Civil Rights Strategic Agenda Methodology:
- The project kicked off with presentations from Helen Gaebler’s UT Law students on fair housing and fair chance hiring for persons with criminal backgrounds (12/01/21)
- Next, the design team (Donald Tracy, Carol Johnson, Helen Gaebler, Cathy McClaugherty, Kelly Nichols, Madeleine Jordan-Lord) met to debrief on the presentations and proposed work group structure and timeline (01/05/22)
- The work group convened for a kickoff meeting to review the deliverable and develop meeting agreements (02/02/22)
- Reentry Roundtable hosted a virtual listening session on fair housing (03/02/22)
- Reentry Roundtable hosted a virtual listening on reentry and homelessness (04/06/22)
- Reentry Roundtable hosted a virtual listening on fair chance hiring and employment (05/04/22)
- Work group met to discuss key takeaways from the listening sessions (05/18/22)
- Work group developed draft strategic agenda, with continued iterations edited collaboratively using Google Docs (06/01/22)
- Reentry Roundtable submitted Civil Rights Strategic Agenda to City of Austin and Travis County (06/30/22)