Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • With Paper Monuments, New Orleanians Draft The City's History Themselves

    Bringing the community into conversations about commemoration opens new ways to present public history. The Paper Monuments project in New Orleans asked residents to draw monuments that they would like to see replace the four Confederate monuments removed in the city. The project brought organizations like the New Orleans Arts Council and New Orleans Public library together with community members to re-imagine new narratives, installations, and representations of local history.

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  • Ruff justice: Meet the dogs helping put child rapists behind bars

    A practice in Johannesburg is making the courtroom and trial process less scary for sexually abused children by letting them play the role of court officials alongside therapy dogs in a pretend court. The Teddy Bear Foundation, responsible for this role play activity, wants children to be less scared but also prepared for their day in court when it comes.

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  • After positive results, Minneapolis looks to expand anti-violence program

    About 40% fewer people were shot in gang-related disputes in Minneapolis during one interval in the first year of the city's Group Violence Intervention initiative. The program uses "call-ins" where people at high risk of shootings meet with law enforcement and other agencies. There they are offered incentives, including needed services, to stop the shootings. It also puts former gang members on the streets, without police involvement, to mediate disputes and counsel young men prone to violence. Based on the initial results, officials planned to expand the program to more parts of the city.

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  • Pennsylvania will no longer hold death-row prisoners in endless solitary confinement

    Following an ACLU-led civil-rights lawsuit, the Pennsylvania Department of Correction has implemented huge changes to the treatment of death row inmates. In prisons across the state, individuals who have been sentenced to death no longer have to undergo strip searches, are allowed to have contact visitations with family and friends, can apply for prison employment, and socialize with others in their unit.

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  • Creative Freedom

    New York-based nonprofit, Rehabilitation Through the Arts (RTA), runs theater programs for individuals experiencing incarceration as a way of improving mental health and reducing recidivism. While the United States’ criminal justice system has been focused on punitive measures, there’s been a trend toward rehabilitation across the country in recent years. Participants in RTA have shown a rate of recidivism of just 5% – compared to a 60% national average – but funding and sustainability remain a consistent hurdle.

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  • Holland Aims to Bring Back Its Starry Nights

    To address the harm - both to human psychology as well as natural ecosystems - of artificial light, The Netherlands calls on its citizens to turn their lights off and feel the effects of a natural darkness. The awareness of negative consequences of artificial light has helped residents reduce light consumption, though turning the lights off is an uphill battle with international corporate powerhouses.

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  • More Seattleites are housing homeless people in their backyards, but it's hard to find the right fit

    In Seattle, the BLOCK project started two years ago to build houses for those experiencing homelessness in backyards. While the project has slow-going - with only 9 matches between families and an unhoused person completed - that's in part because the non-profit is incredibly deliberate about its process in recognition of some controversy the idea has recieved.

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  • Houston, we have a solution: How the city curbed homelessness

    Across the country, governments at every level are working to tackle homelessness. In Houston, connecting permanent housing to services has proven an effective strategy but it has required an increase in affordable housing stock and more strategic organization between non-profits and officials.

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  • Reusable Bag Share

    When the town of Collingswood started deliberating a bag ban, a leader from Friends of the Farmers’ Market stepped up, creating the Collingswood Bag Share. Community members were worried about the economic impact of fewer sales at the market if consumers did not have bags, and they can now purchase or borrow reusable bags in a sustainable way.

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  • The judge, jury and lawyers are kids. But punishments at N.J. youth court are real.

    The 10-year-old Newark Youth Court has heard some 700 cases in which high school students serve as judge, jury, and lawyers in proceedings that avoid school discipline or criminal charges with creative exercises in personal accountability. Taking aim at fights, disruptive behavior, or more serious offenses involving weapons or drugs. the Youth Court seeks to encourage better life choices. Outcomes may exclude punishment altogether, imposing community service (including Youth Court jury duty) or other alternatives to jail, avoiding criminal records that can ruin someone's future.

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