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June,
2006
Read On About:
HOUSE BILL 181
SURJ needs your help!
Passage of
House Bill 181, the bill which
would fully repeal Delaware’s mandatory minimum drug sentencing laws,
continues to be SURJ’s #1 priority. Since the Legislative Session of
the 143rd General Assembly resumed in January, SURJ has
worked hard to bring House Bill 181 up for a vote in the House of
Representatives. As you may recall, House Bill 181 was voted
unanimously out of committee last June. Although over half of the
legislature has signed on as co-sponsors of the bill and more than three
dozen community and faith-based organizations have voiced their support
for the passage of this bill, HB 181 still has not been brought up for a
vote.
We need you to take action on House
Bill 181! Contact your legislators and let them know that you support
the passage of this crucial piece of legislation. Even if your
legislator is a sponsor or co-sponsor of the bill, it is still important
that they hear from you. Please thank them for their support and let
them know that now is the time to vote on and pass House Bill 181. To
find out who your legislators are, click
here, or contact the SURJ office (E-mail:
info@surj.org; Phone: 302-426-9252).
HB 181 Sponsors:
Rep. DiPinto, Sens. McDowell and Sorenson
HB 181 Co-sponsors:
Reps. Cathcart, Ennis, George-Marshall, Gilligan, Fallon, Hall-Long,
Hudson, Johnson, Keeley, Lavelle, Lofink, Longhurst, Maier, McWilliams,
Miro, Mulrooney, Oberle, Plant, Schooley, Spence, Stone, VanSant, Viola,
Wagner; Sens. Bunting, Cloutier, Copeland, Henry, Peterson, Simpson,
Sokola
Why do we need to repeal
mandatory minimum drug sentencing laws in Delaware?
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This bill would return to judges the discretion
to tailor sentences to individuals according to the offender’s role in
the offense, the seriousness of the offense, and the potential for
rehabilitation.
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One-size-fits-all mandatory minimum drug
sentences are inaccurate and risk adding to our already bloated
incarcerated population.
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These laws are expensive:
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Delaware spends more, per capita, on
corrections expenditures than any other state and has one of the
highest incarceration rates in the country;
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Each inmate costs Delaware taxpayers $26,000 a
year; and
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Alternatives to incarceration, such as drug
treatment, would be more cost-effective.
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These laws are ineffective:
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These laws are unjust:
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They transfer sentencing authority from an
objective, neutral judge with all the facts of the case to an
adversarial prosecutor, who may not have all the facts, which opens
the door to injustice through the use of plea-bargaining.
SURJ Joins the
Delaware Reentry Consortium
Last summer, SURJ was invited to join
a group of advocates who were interested in coming together to discuss
the plight of the formerly incarcerated in Delaware. What began as a
series of brown bag lunches, has grown to become the Delaware Reentry
Consortium (DRC).
The goal of the Consortium is to bring
together the many organizations that work with the formerly incarcerated
and find ways to combine forces and work together. SURJ hopes to
provide public education and policy support to this initiative. Other
organizations that have joined the DRC include: Delaware Center for
Justice, Goodwill Industries, Society of St. Vincent DePaul,
Alternatives to Violence Project, New Life Christian Center, Center for
Relational Living, Delaware Mentoring Program, Methodist Action Program
and Building Bridges, Inc.
An update
on the Delaware Reentry Roundtable
We are pleased to announce that JoAnne Page, President and
Chief Executive Officer of the
Fortune Society, will be the keynote
speaker at the Delaware Reentry Roundtable scheduled for September 29,
2006 at Widener Law School. Located in New York City, the Fortune
Society was one of the first non-profit organizations in the country to
search for solutions to the problems facing the formerly
incarcerated. Run almost entirely by former prisoners the Fortune
Society “exists to help prisoners, former prisoners, and those facing
jail or prison time.” (www.fortunesociety.org)
Help SURJ
in its Outreach Efforts
SURJ needs your
help spreading our message. We are available to speak to groups of any
size, and are always looking for new events to attend.
Recent SURJ sightings:
Dana worked at an information booth at the Episcopal Diocesan
convention, and Stephanie spoke at the Delaware Women’s Conference and
also appeared on Bayard Marin’s “Law Doctor” show on WDEL.
Upcoming Events: SURJ
staff will be manning a booth at the upcoming Newark Nite event on June
3, 2006. As always, we would appreciate any help from SURJ members who
could volunteer their time. Contact Dana (dsorenson@surj.org)
for more information.
Stephanie will be
addressing the issue of mandatory minimum drug sentencing at Lutheran
Day in Dover. Members are encouraged to join us at 10 A.M. in the
Senate Hearing Room at Legislative Hall on June 7, 2006.
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Visions of Justice VII:
Girl
Trouble
More than one hundred
people came together for the seventh annual Visions of Justice forum on
April 21, 2006 at University of Delaware’s Clayton Hall. This event,
co-sponsored by SURJ, the Delaware Center for Justice,
the League of
Women Voters of Delaware, and the Delaware Coalition Against Domestic Violence
featured the award-winning documentary, Girl Trouble. The film
details the lives of three girls caught up in San Francisco’s juvenile
justice system and demonstrates the difficulty the girls have “getting
out of the system.” (For more information about the film visit:
www.girltrouble.org.)
Co-producer and director,
Lexi Leban, introduced the film. After volunteering with the
Center
for Young Women’s Development in San Francisco, she decided to film a
year in the life of three of the girls she met at the center. After
four years of filming, Girl Trouble was completed in 2004. Since
its introduction, the film has won numerous awards and has been used as
a vehicle for public education about girls in the juvenile justice
system.
After the film, a panel of distinguished Delaware speakers
discussed how the film related to the experiences of girls in Delaware
and stressed the need for gender-specific programming in Delaware’s
juvenile justice system. The panel included: The Honorable Chandlee J.
Kuhn, Chief Judge of Family Court; Nancy Pearsall, Director of Youth
Rehabilitative Services for the Department of Children, Youth and their
Families; and, Paulette Sullivan Moore, Policy Coordinator for the
Delaware Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
SURJ Supports Federal
Second Chance Act of 2005
On October 27, 2005, the Federal Second
Chance Act of 2005 was introduced on the Senate floor. This bill,
introduced by Senate Judiciary Chair Arlan Specter (R-PA) along with
Senators Joe Biden and Sam Brownback (R-KS), has co-sponsors from across
the political spectrum such as Senators Rick Santorum (R-PA) and Barack
Obama (D-IL). The Federal Second Chance Act would provide $100 million
in federal competitive grants for re-entry initiatives, would create a
federal re-entry taskforce, and establish a national re-entry resource
center. There is also a companion piece of legislation in the House
that was introduced by Representative Robert Portman (R-OH) on April 19,
2005.
In a letter to the Washington Post
(2/22/06), Senator Brownback wrote: “Reducing recidivism benefits
taxpayers, who must shoulder the burden of rising prison costs. More
important, the reduction in crime that comes with reduced recidivism is
a great public benefit. We should not be resigned to allowing
generation after generation to return to prison because they don’t have
the tools to break the cycle. The Second Chance Act could help stop
this pernicious cycle.”
Senator Biden offered this perspective
in a news release this fall: “A relatively modest investment in offender
reentry efforts compares very well with the alternative – building more
prisons for these ex-offenders to return to if they are unable to
successfully reenter their communities.”
SURJ supports the Second
Chance Act of 2005, and we encourage SURJ members to contact Senator
Biden, Senator Carper, and Representative Castle and voice their support
for the passage of S. 1934 and H.R. 1704.
Thank you!
A warm thank you is due to
all SURJ members who have generously donated to SURJ during our
2005-2006 Annual Appeals drive. Support from our members is crucial if
we are to continue in our struggle. If you have not yet contributed to
SURJ, please consider doing so. While SURJ has made great progress in
the last five years—much more remains to be done.
We would also like to
express our appreciation to these corporate and organizational donors
who have generously contributed to SURJ this year.
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Bernardon Haber Holloway
Architects PC
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Good Samaritan Foundation
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Lifer’s Group at Sussex
Correctional Institution
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National Alliance of Social
Workers
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NKS
Distributors
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Wilmington Trust
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Women’s
Alliance of the First Unitarian Church, WIlmington, DE
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WSFS
Thanks to all
those who donated to the Women’s Work Release Center!
When we sent out word in
the January 2006 Action Track that the Women's Work Release
Center was in need of professional clothing and books, we had no idea
that we would see such a strong show of support from SURJ members and
allies. The response was so great that the Center could not accept any
more donations! A special thanks to Larry Thurrell of Hockessin
Library, the League of Women Voters of New Castle County, June Peterson,
Joanna Champney, Stephanie Campbell, Annabelle Kressman, and the many
others who took the time to respond to our request.
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