A Reflection on a Norman Rockwell Classic

by | Dec 12, 2014

On September 25, 1954, the cover of The Saturday Evening Post featured what would become one of Norman Rockwell’s most iconic and revered paintings. It’s called “Breaking Home Ties” and it tells a poignant story:

A father and son sit side-by-side on the running board of a farm truck with a barely-visible railroad track in the foreground. The son sits upright, dressed in a suit and tie, train ticket protruding from his pocket, and a suitcase – adorned with a “State U” sticker – resting on the ground between his feet. The father, wearing blue denim work clothes, is leaning over with his elbows resting on his knees.

823581190_b52973c490_oOne of the more interesting aspects of the painting is the gaze of each person. The weary and slouched father appears to be looking down the track in one direction, while the college-bound son fixes his eyes-wide-open stare in the other direction. The juxtaposed postures and gazes speak of the past and future, of the obligations of the present versus the opportunities of tomorrow.

This Rockwell masterpiece is about more than heading off to college. It’s about that hopeful glance toward the future. It’s about the optimistic belief held by generations of American parents that their children would face a bright future – one possibly brighter than their own and one full of opportunity.

To be clear, by “brighter future” I do not mean “more material wealth.” Most parents, whether or not they can put it in words, have a fuller, more meaningful vision for the wellbeing of their children. It’s a vision that includes healthy relationships, strong families, steady employment and the opportunity to develop one’s God-given potential.

And there’s the rub.

I know you share my hope of making Georgia a state in which every single person has a real chance to prosper. And if public officials aren’t going to aggressively identify and remove barriers to opportunity, we at the Georgia Center for Opportunity will. That’s our mission. And that’s our obligation of the present.

We’ve been working hard to remove barriers to opportunity for the past two decades so that ALL have a real chance to prosper and an opportunity at a brighter future. I hope you’ll read through our initiatives page to learn more about the work we’re doing in areas such as education, family and community, healthcare access, and prisoner reentry. You can also join us in this important work by making a tax-deductible gift today.

A Real Chance to Prosper Event Recap

by | Dec 10, 2014

Georgia Center for Opportunity’s annual fundraiser, a Real Chance to Prosper, on December 4th was a great success. It brought together around 200 people at the newly opened College Football Hall of Fame for a night celebrating the legacy of the late Jack Kemp and raising important funds for GCO’s work.

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The event provided guests an opportunity to tour the College Football Hall of Fame including many interactive exhibits. During the reception, Jeff and Jimmy Kemp shared stories about their dad and gave insight into the kind of father, football player, and political figure he was.

There were several great items auctioned off throughout the evening from both a live and a silent auction, including a premier cruise excursion, a Peyton Manning signed jersey, an Al Pacino “The Godfather” signed shadowbox, and platinum tickets to the BB&T Atlanta Tennis Open. All donations from the night are used to support our mission to remove barriers to opportunity and ultimately help more Georgians achieve a better life.

Jack Kemp’s beliefs that we must reach every heart and ensure all individuals have the opportunity to reach their God-given potential are ones that we hold dear at GCO. That’s why we’re involved in the work of removing barriers to opportunity by promoting strong families, access to quality education, and steady employment, and why we’re so grateful for the sponsors, attendees, and volunteers who helped make this event a success.

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If you would like to support GCO’s important work, we invite you to make a gift now.

Make a Gift

Felony Conviction, Barrier to Obtaining Professional License

by | Nov 12, 2014

Barber Shop

Professional License Restrictions

Those who have “been convicted of any felony or of any crime involving moral turpitude in the courts of this state or any other state, territory, or country” are subject to having their application denied on account of their conviction.[i] This restriction severely curtails the number of professions available to people coming out of prison, many of which offer considerable promise for returning citizens given the vocational training they received in prison.

As it stands now, nearly 80 professions are off-limits to those with a felony conviction, including becoming a barber, cosmetologist, electrical contractor, plumber, conditioned air contractor, auctioneer, utility contractor, registered trade sanitarian, and scrap metal processor, among others.[ii]

Lift Restrictions and Open-Up Job Opportunities

In order to open-up a greater range of professions for returning citizens, the state of Georgia should lift blanket restrictions on professional licenses. Some of the professions most suitable to returning citizens’ skillsets are currently inaccessible to them because they are barred from acquiring a license in those professions. These blanket restrictions should be replaced with reasonable criteria for determining whether a given profession is suitable for a person given his or her criminal history.

As is the case for determining whether any particular job is suitable for a person given his or her felony conviction, professional licensing boards should consider the following factors in determining whether the granting of a license is appropriate:

  • The nature of the crime committed and its relation to the license sought
  • The time elapsed since the crime
  • The applicant’s age at the time of the crime
  • The evidence that the applicant has been rehabilitated[iii]

By using these criteria, professional licensing boards can eliminate unreasonable licensing restrictions while ensuring that public safety is protected. A person might be restricted from obtaining a license in one profession due to the nature of his or her crime, but prove to be an excellent candidate for receiving a license in numerous other professions where his or her crime is unrelated. These decisions must always be determined on a case-by-case basis, just as they are for applicants without a felony conviction.

A Look at Other States

Many states are already working toward increasing opportunities for those with felony convictions to obtain professional licenses. Currently, “21 states have standards that require a ‘direct,’ ‘rational,’ or ‘reasonable’ relationship between the license sought and the applicant’s criminal history to justify the agency’s denial of a license.”[iv]

  • Colorado law mandates that a felony conviction or other offense involving “moral turpitude” cannot, in and of itself, prevent a person from applying for and receiving an occupational license.[v]
  • New Mexico only allows occupational licensing authorities to disqualify applicants from felony or misdemeanor convictions involving “moral turpitude” if they are directly related to the position or license sought.[vi]
  • Connecticut requires a state agency to first consider the relationship between the offense and the job, the applicant’s post-conviction rehabilitation, and the time elapsed since conviction and release before determining a person is not suitable for a license.[vii]
  • Louisiana forbids licensing agencies from disqualifying a person from obtaining a license or practicing a trade solely because of a prior criminal record, unless the conviction directly relates to the specific occupation. In the event the applicant is denied because of a conviction, the reason for the decision must be made explicit in writing.[viii]

Conclusion

Enabling people with felony convictions to acquire professional licenses in Georgia would benefit a variety of stakeholders. Not only would it give returning citizens greater access to a variety of occupations and enable them to support themselves and their families, it would also make the most of current job-training programs offered in state prisons, create opportunities for expansion and partnership with technical schools, and enable offenders to maximize their time in prison and develop transferable job skills.  Together, these advantages would work to reduce recidivism, utilize taxpayer dollars more efficiently, and promote public safety in Georgia.

 

Image credit: Wrightsville Beach Plumbing (featured image) and Mahanomi Health and Beauty Care Info

[i] O.C.G.A. § 43-1-19; italics added.

[ii] O.C.G.A. §§ 43-1 to 43-51.

[iii] Legal Action Center, “Recommended Key Provisions,” para. 6, http://www.lac.org/toolkits/standards/ Key%20Provisions%20-%20Standards.pdf.

[iv] Legal Action Center, “Standards for Hiring People with Criminal Records,” Advocacy Toolkits to Combat Legal Barriers Facing Individuals with Criminal Records, accessed November 29, 2013, para. 8, http://www.lac.org/toolkits/standards/standards.htm.

[v] Colo. Rev. Stat. § 24-5-101; Legal Action Center, “Overview of State Laws that Ban Discrimination by Employers,” 2, http://www.lac.org/toolkits/standards/Fourteen_State_Laws.pdf.

[vi] Legal Action Center, “Overview of State Laws,” 3.

[vii] Ibid., 1.

[viii] La. Rev. Stat. § 37:2950.

 

This post was adapted from Georgia Center for Opportunity’s December 2013 report titled Increasing Employment Opportunities for Ex-Offenders.

Georgia Positioned to be a National Leader in Prisoner Reentry

by | Nov 5, 2014

Governor Deal

Governor Nathan Deal

Georgia is receiving national attention as the state recently received four competitive federal grants from the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to implement its Prisoner Reentry Initiative (GA-PRI). Georgia is the only state to have received all four grants at one time – a testament to the smart framework that the state has developed to bring about significant reductions in recidivism.

The Governor’s Office of Transition, Support and Reentry (GOTSR) developed the GA-PRI Framework with the assistance of the Center for Justice Innovation last fall and began taking steps to implement it at five pilot sites around the state. GOTSR took these steps knowing that additional funding would be necessary to successfully carry out this initiative.

The office applied for the BJA grants around the beginning of summer with the hopes that it would receive the funding necessary to hire the right staff, provide evidence-based training and implementation, improve information sharing and measuring outcomes, and establish quality assurance mechanisms.

Jay Neal, executive director of GOTSR, explained that the office applied for the grants with the expectation that each one would fund a different component of the initiative and build on each other. This created a package deal that would enable the state to fully implement the GA-PRI framework without duplicating funds. This smart strategy appealed to BJA, who awarded the office each grant for which it applied.

The four grants that Georgia received for this initiative include:

 

Smart Supervision Grant Department of Corrections; Governor’s Office of Transition, Support and Reentry $750,000
Statewide Recidivism Reduction Grant Department of Corrections; Governor’s Office of Transition, Support and Reentry $3,000,000
Justice Information Sharing Solutions Grant Criminal Justice Coordinating Council $498,234
Justice Reinvestment: Maximizing State Reforms Grant Department of Corrections; Governor’s Office of Transition, Support and Reentry $1,750,000

 

Now that the state has received these grants, the next challenge will be to put all of its planning into action. This implementation phase will be critical to the success of prisoner reentry reform in Georgia, and the state understands that it will take collaboration among all stakeholders in the community for it to be successful, including businesses, churches, educational institutions, non-profits, and others.

GOTSR will be presenting its three year implementation strategy at the Justice Reinvestment National Summit in San Diego (November 17-19, 2014) where hundreds of people from over 30 states will be represented. These states will be looking at Georgia to see how well the state can implement its new reentry framework to reduce recidivism.

Georgia’s goal is to see a decrease in recidivism by seven percent in two years, and by 11 percent over five years.

Jay Neal

Jay Neal, Executive Director of the Governor’s Office of Transition, Support and Reentry

The momentum for reform is strong right now in Georgia, but the true test of the state’s commitment to preparing citizens for successful reintegration will have to be seen in the coming years as the inevitable difficulties of implementation arise.

For now, the state’s leaders seem prepared to face those challenges as they arise. There is a prevailing optimism that can be heard in government boardrooms and local reentry coalitions around the state, especially as people recount the incredible progress that has been made in Georgia over the last four years in the area of criminal justice reform.

 

Image credit:  The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (featured image), The Wall Street Journal, and The Polk Fish Wrap