OSI-Baltimore’s Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program seeks to reduce mass incarceration in Baltimore and Maryland through strategies that dismantle structural racism in criminal justice policies and promote restorative justice as the way to achieve lasting and widely-shared community safety.
2019 was a year of planning and strategizing for the Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program. We continued the important work of policing reform, partnering with U.S.-based and international Open Society Foundation colleagues to convene law enforcement officers, advocates, and community leaders to share challenges and identify ways we can work together to transform policing culture, policies, and practices. These efforts included a convening in Nairobi, Kenya, which brought together stakeholders from five continents to talk about policing reform in a global context, exchange ideas and learnings, and set the stage for more coordinated efforts in 2020 and beyond.
The Criminal and Juvenile Justice Program worked to convene a wide range of grantees and community advocates such as Homeless Persons Representation Project, Power Inside, Disability Rights Maryland, SWOP Baltimore, Public Justice Center, and Baltimore Harm Reduction Coalition —to name just a few—to take on the ambitious project of decriminalizing race, poverty, gender, and disability in Maryland to reduce incarceration and police The program also worked to increase the use of restorative justice practices—like those provided by OSI grantee Restorative Response Baltimore—as an alternative to the criminal justice system.
We also spent 2019 thoughtfully reframing and restructuring our work to increase investments in organizations led by people of color, such as Baltimore Ceasefire, Black Leaders Organizing for Change, and those most negatively impacted by current justice systems, such as Out for Justice and Life After Release.
Monica Cooper of Maryland Justice Project, an OSI grantee, talks to a reporter about efforts to “Ban the Box” in Maryland.
2019: A Year of Restorative Justice
With support from OSI-Baltimore, grantees Out for Justice, Job Opportunities Task Force, Maryland Justice Project, and the ACLU of Maryland, helped win the restoration of voting rights for people with felony convictions immediately upon their release from prison. Previously people had to complete parole, probation, and pay any outstanding fines and restitution before they got their voting rights back. In another victory for the formerly incarcerated, in 2019, OSI grantees supported the Maryland Legislature in adopting a statewide “Ban the Box” policy for employment applications. That means that employers are prohibited from asking if applicants have a criminal record on hiring applications. Finally, OSI-Baltimore’s support of our grantees helped bring about a legislative mandate that the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services conduct a gender-based study to determine how to better prepare and support women who are being released from prison after years of incarceration.
Advocates for Children and Youth
$100,000 over one year to engage in outreach, education and advocacy to reduce the number of youth impacted by Maryland’s juvenile justice system, with fewer young people involved at every level.
American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Maryland
$125,000 over one year to support its policy analysis and education efforts to decriminalize certain conduct, increase police accountability, and reduce pretrial detention in Baltimore and Maryland.*
Baltimore Action Legal Team
$100,000 over one year to increase its capacity to operate a bail fund to reduce pretrial incarceration and engage Baltimore lawyers in supporting local social and racial justice movements.*
Baltimore Algebra Project
$45,000 over one year to engage in public education, organizing and advocacy to improve school police accountability and reduce youth incarceration in Maryland.
Baltimoreans for Transparent and Accountable Law Enforcement
$65,000 over one year to support the education and organizing efforts to improve civilian oversight of the police in Baltimore.*
Baltimore Ceasefire 365
$75,000 over 18 months to increase the civic capacity of Baltimore residents to confront the root causes of gun violence in Baltimore, and to uplift interventions that heal the harm done by gun violence.*
Black Leaders Organizing for Change
$150,000 over two years to increase civic engagement and build political power among youth and communities in Baltimore most impacted by gun violence and mass incarceration.*
Bmore Awesome
$75,000 over 18 months to engage in youth leadership development, organizing and advocacy to reform youth justice and school discipline, and address the root causes of gun violence in Baltimore.
CASA de Maryland
$100,000 over one year to support the continued activities of the Campaign for Justice, Safety & Jobs to bring about policing reforms in Baltimore and Maryland.
CASA de Maryland
$30,000 over one year to enable the Grantee to engage youth in collecting community input to bring about policing reform in Baltimore.
Citizens Policing Project
$55,000 over one year to engage youth in collecting community input to bring about policing reform in Baltimore.*
F.R.E.S.H. Fully Restoring Every Sons Hope
$25,000 over one year to engage in outreach, education and advocacy to reduce the number of youth impacted at all levels of Maryland’s juvenile justice system.
Good Kids Mad City
$35,000 over one year to engage in public education, organizing and advocacy to reduce gun violence in Baltimore.*
Greater Baybrook Alliance
$75,000 over one year to establish a non-punitive, community-based public health intervention model to address the needs of sex workers in two Baltimore neighborhoods.
Jews United for Justice
$62,500 over 15 months to support grassroots organizing, education and advocacy efforts, in participation with coalitions, to bring about positive reforms in policing and pretrial services in Baltimore and Maryland.
JFA Institute
$59,000 over nine months to provide training and technical assistance to the Maryland Department of Public Safety & Correctional Services to lower prison and jail populations.
Job Opportunities Task Force
$100,000 over one year to engage in research, communications, public education and advocacy to reduce the collateral consequences of criminal justice involvement.
Justice Policy Institute
$146,000 over 14 months to engage in research, policy advocacy and communications efforts to support criminal justice reform campaigns in Baltimore and Maryland.
Life After Release
$25,000 over one year to engage in outreach, education and advocacy to reduce the number of youth impacted at all levels by Maryland’s juvenile justice system.
Maryland Justice Project
$35,000 over one year to reduce mass incarceration and advance social justice, with a focus on women and girls who have had contact with the criminal justice system.*
Mile 22 Civic Labs
$75,000 over 18 months to expand the capacity of the #BaltimoreVotes initiative to increase civic participation and leadership among young people and other Baltimoreans affected by policies that threaten their health and safety.*
No Boundaries Coalition
$50,000 over one year to engage in public education, organizing and community engagements efforts to reduce gun violence in Baltimore.*
Out for Justice
$65,000 over one year to reduce incarceration and collateral consequences of justice involvement through public education, grassroots organizing and leadership development of people impacted by the justice system.
Progressive Maryland Education Fund
$50,000 over one year to support organizing and communications activities to eliminate bail and expand pretrial services in Baltimore and Maryland.
Public Justice Center
$35,000 over one year to explore, support and, where viable, pursue legal actions designed to eliminate or reduce the use of money bail and bring about pretrial reform in Baltimore.
Restorative Response Baltimore
$50,000 over one year to provide general support.
Youth As Resources
$100,000 over two years to support organizing, base-building, and institutional reform efforts to hold school police accountable to students and resist the presence of armed police in schools.*
The People’s Commission to Decriminalize Maryland
Baltimore Action Legal Team
$125,000 over one year to provide operational and administrative support to a statewide effort to decriminalize race, poverty, gender and disability in Maryland.
Center for Children’s Law and Policy
$100,000 over one year to provide expert analysis of Maryland’s current criminal and juvenile laws and make recommendations for how to reduce youth contact with the justice system.
Job Opportunities Task Force
$50,000 over one year to engage in public education and advocacy efforts to highlight and then reduce the criminalization of poverty in Baltimore and Maryland.
Justice Policy Institute
$100,000 over two years to provide strategic communications support to help shape and advance recommendations on how to reduce the arrest and incarceration of marginalized communities.
Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Service
$10,000 over one year to upgrade an automated software program and database that is used by legal and social justice organizations, among others, to better serve their clients.
Power Inside
$25,000 over one year to connect with, educate and empower women impacted by the criminal justice system to advocate to reduce over criminalization and over incarceration.
