From Simmering to Optimistic, In Just a Week

By Steven Scarborough, Communications Manager

New research from the Rand Institute shows that nearly 140,000 business owners were initially disqualified from accessing PPP loans during the pandemic because they had a felony record. These numbers are just one example of the myriad difficulties that people with a criminal record encounter in starting and running a business.

Why It Matters: Many justice-involved people decide to start small businesses because many companies won’t hire them — roughly 3.8 percent of all small-business owners have a criminal record. The collateral consequences that come with that record hamper these entrepreneurs’ ability to start and grow their businesses. "Banks won’t even talk to us," says Minneapolis resident K.B. Brown, who started a print shop using a second mortgage on his home.

What's Next: State legislatures across the country are increasingly focused on removing the legal barriers that prevent people with a record from reintegrating into society. In just the first six months of this year, states have passed over 100 bills aimed at reducing the collateral consequences that people involved with the justice system face. AV continues to work with our partners to continue repealing these legal barriers. We are also supporting the development of a policy framework by the Collateral Consequences Resource Center that would encourage government agencies to support small business owners with a record, rather than disqualifying them based on their conviction history.

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By Rhiannon Meyers Collette, Communications Manager

Ask anyone with a chronic illness and they'll tell you: Navigating the U.S. health care system is excessively challenging. For the more than 12 million people who are low-income and elderly or disabled, these challenges are magnified by the fragmentation of the two distinct programs that cover them: Medicare and Medicaid. 

What’s Happening: Integrating care is a solution to addressing this fragmentation, but only 1 in 10 dual-eligible individuals is enrolled in a fully integrated care plan. AV grantee ATI Advisory says the sheer breadth of options can be overwhelming. "There are 82,155 Medicare Advantage plans available when you include each unique plan and county combination across the nation," writes Allison Rizer of ATI. "Read that again: 82,155."

Why It Matters: Care coordination is essential to ensure better health outcomes for people who qualify for Medicare and Medicaid. Dual-eligible beneficiaries need a trusted source to help them navigate the complexity of these systems and their health conditions. The federal government, states, and health plans all have a responsibility to improve their integrated care programs and the consumer experience of duals enrolled in those plans.

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Related: Check out the 10 areas for improvement needed now. 

By Evan Mintz, Communications Manager
 

Somehow reefer madness returned. 
 

This week a couple of cable news talking heads speculated as to whether legal marijuana was the driving cause behind a spike in gun violence in Washington D.C. “A direct connection between the violence and pot usage,” as one host put it. 
 

And what was their source of this bizarre and inaccurate claim? A one-off comment by the D.C. police chief about anecdotes of gun crimes centered on illegal selling operations. 
 

You might be tempted to laugh at the absurdity. No, marijuana isn’t causing violent crime. But this kind of fact-free media speculation is no joke. The increase in gun violence across the United States requires a serious, dedicated response. People are senselessly dying in cities big and small, Democratic and Republican. The last thing we need is national media blaming convenient scapegoats while actual causes (and potential solutions) go ignored. 
 

Unfortunately, this isn’t just an issue in Washington. New York’s bail reform spurred a cottage industry of headline writers stoking evidence-free fears that the new rules were causing a crime wave. 
 

“But rhetoric is not fact, and the facts are clear: Bail reform is not responsible for the rise in gun violence,” Jullian Harris-Calvin, director of the Greater Justice New York program at the Vera Institute of Justice, wrote in the New York Daily News this week. 

As she points out in her oped, “Judges continued to set bail in nearly 75% of gun possession cases. And when released, people charged with gun possession were rearrested at lower rates than people charged with other offenses.”
 

That’s what the data shows. 
 

The data also shows that community-centered violence interruption and public health interventions can be effective at preventing and reducing crime — sometimes even better than traditional policing.  
 

Political leaders and members of the media need to start demanding evidence and data when they hear wild claims about the causes of and solutions to gun violence. Without this objective information, effective policy becomes elusive and productive debate becomes impossible. 

 
Related: The Black Wall Street Journal explains why perpetuating an “us versus them” mentality between police and the community ignores the root causes of gun violence.

“Racially Charged: America’s Misdemeanor Problem,” a sobering 30-minute documentary from Brave New Films streaming on YouTube that draws a clear through line from the Black Codes of the Reconstruction era to our modern-day system of criminal justice. The film uses an effective split-screen format to compare first-person accounts of those charged under Black Codes (voiced by actor Mahershala Ali) with case studies from today, while expert talking heads put context around the use of misdemeanors as a form of social control and profiteering that unjustly target people of color. “In the misdemeanor system, there is no act too small that the state cannot render a crime,” says Harvard Law professor Alexandra Natapoff. The filmmakers show how these so-called minor infractions — jaywalking, not wearing a seatbelt, having a broken taillight — are anything but minor for those whose lives are turned upside down by the cascading effects of the legal system. What’s more grievous is how misdemeanors have become the “gateway for police violence and murder.” The deaths of Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Philando Castille, Freddie Gray, George Floyd, and many more all began with a police interaction over a misdemeanor. A warning: Scenes recalling these police interactions and deaths at the end of the film are difficult to watch.
 
Related: Some states have stopped police from arresting people for misdemeanor offenses. Data scientist Samuel Sinyangwe writes in FiveThirtyEight that this approach appears to have helped reduce the number of shootings by police — not made violent crime worse. 

Aug. 18-20: The free, virtual 20th Annual State Criminal Justice Network Conference includes a panel on the “Year in Police Reform,” with AV’s VP of Criminal Justice Walter Katz, DeRay McKesson, co-founder of Campaign Zero, and  Kami Chavis, professor of law and director of the criminal justice program at Wake Forest University School of Law. It’s moderated by ACLU’s Paige Fernandez. Learn more and register here.

• Simone Biles’ hometown stands proudly behind her. Houston should probably throw her the biggest welcome-home parade ever. “Let’s make sure she knows how much we appreciate her, and not simply because she’s the greatest gymnast of all time. We get that part of her story. Everyone does. But here in Houston, we know she’s about more than that.”
   
• Also, if you are feeling the urge to be critical of Biles, I suggest consulting this decision tree first.
   
• Get to know Suni Lee, the first Hmong American to compete in the Olympics, who defended Team USA's title by winning gold in the women's individual all-around gymnastics final. She has an inspiring back story of her own: This short video on her path to Tokyo is worth a watch.
   
• I love this heartwarming roundup of the best viral moments happening on the Olympic sidelines.
   
• COVID has added a beautiful new tradition to the games: Athletes on the podium are helping each other don their medals, NPR reports. This is just wholesome.

The Prosecution team at Arnold Ventures and the National Partnership for Pretrial Justice are accepting proposals for research on the role of prosecution and prosecutorial decisions at various points along the criminal justice process. Learn more here.

Our Complex Care team is funding research into how to improve the systems that deliver care to a population of more than 12 million people who are dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid. Learn more here.

The Criminal Justice and Evidence-Based Policy teams at Arnold Ventures are teaming up to learn more about what works in criminal justice reform in an ongoing request for proposals for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that will test programs and practices. There is no deadline for submissions.

The Evidence-Based Policy team invites grant applications to conduct randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of social programs in any area of U.S. policy. Details are here.

View all of our RFPs here.