Bring the public safety committee meeting to order.

Roll call, please.

Committee members Coleman.

Here, present Johnson.

Jost.

Kim.

Here.

Naker.

Here.

Yang.

Chair Bowie.

Here.

Five present to absent mean Councilmember Yang and Councilmember Johnson, who are excused.

Thank you so much.

Well, welcome everyone.

This is our fourth uh public safety and community wellness committee meeting.

And particularly what we're going to have on the agenda are two items today, and I just wanted to just do a quick little overview of why these items are on the agenda.

Um, you know, for particularly for the public safety committee meeting, one of our um intentions is to make sure we're reviewing our community first public safety framework and initiatives.

And uh one of the items on the agenda is the returning home Saint Paul Pilot, uh, that began in twenty twenty.

Paul pilot that began in 2020 and in partnership with several community partners, including Housing Link Ujama Place and also Minnesota Justice Research Center who will be here today presenting on the report, their comprehensive report.

So there's two attachments for that agenda item, and we'll be hearing from our speaker from the Minnesota Justice Research Research Center, excuse me.

And our second item for today is on the justice impacted as a protected class.

And for this agenda item, we're gonna have more so of like a three-prong approach, particularly around reviewing this policy as an informational overview of this policy in other cities.

We're gonna ask for our deputy director, Beth Commerce from Hero, to review our existing ordinance.

I want to be really clear that she's gonna be reviewing the the definition of our current protected class, chapter 183.

Following our other speaker, Paul and Marese from the Justice Equity Coalition from the ACLU Minnesota, and a series of uh coalition members who are going to be providing their advocacy and education to this body, particularly around this policy and how this policy has made some great headways in other cities across the country.

And last but not least, uh, we'll be hearing from our third speaker for that second item, um, Neil Rivers from the new justice projects, particularly speaking on the barriers to housing and how the justice impacted uh as a protected uh class will uh help to remove some of those barriers, particularly around having access to housing.

So without further ado, we're just gonna make sure we're jumping in.

I'm going to be looking for questions from from colleagues, but we're going to start with um bringing up from Minnesota Research Justice Center.

We have Kathleen who's going to give a review on the returning home St.

Paul.

So glad to have you here, Miss Kathleen.

Or Katie, excuse me.

Um my mom calls me Kathleen when I'm in trouble.

So I'm feeling entered up here.

But Katie is fine.

Um, thank you.

Do you want me to just launch into my presentation?

Absolutely.

Okay, well, thank you so much, um, Terry Bowie.

It's nice to see you all.

Good afternoon.

So I'm gonna take a little bit of time to talk about um an evaluation that we did in partnership with the city of St.

Paul back in 2020 and 2021 about a pilot program called Returning Home St.

Paul.

So I'm gonna go kind of fast and really skip ahead to findings and recommendations that I think will be most relevant, but I've got extra slides if folks have questions.

So, just a little bit about the Minnesota Justice Research Center or the JRC.

Um, we are a small nonpartisan nonprofit dedicated to transforming our criminal legal system.

Um, so we seek one a criminal legal system that promotes public safety by being more equitable, accountable, and restorative in delivering justice.

We do this through research, education, and policy development.

So I'm the research director at our org, and returning home St.

Paul evaluation is an example of some of the work that we do in partnership with government agencies and other organizations throughout our state.

So uh talking about housing for returning citizens, um, just a high-level overview of the issue.

So research tells us that people who have spent time in prison are seven times more likely to experience homelessness than the general public.

Also, that somewhere between, for one study, somewhere between 60 to 88% of respondents in a returning home study reported living with family members upon release.

So identifying and finding supportive housing for folks when they return home is really important and really challenging.

Research also shows us that there are significant restrictions, in particular for public housing and housing vouchers, but also significant landlord resistance.

And so these things combine to make housing sometimes seemingly impossible to access for those who are returning home.

So this is the issue that returning home St.

Paul set out to address in part.

So returning home St.

Paul, again, it began back in 2020.

It's a small pilot program, um, I believe housed in the Office of Financial Empowerment at that time.

And there were really three big goals with returning home St.

Paul.

The first was to increase housing access.

So specifically, the program looked to house returning citizens to market rate housing beyond just public housing, um, both to sort of avoid some of those restrictions I mentioned, but also to really expand access, expand the possible places where individuals returning home might be able to find housing.

Um, the second goal of the program was really to bridge that transition from re-entry to self-sufficiency.

So a big component of the program, as you mentioned, was partnerships with nonprofits or organizations that work to support people in that transition.

So specifically working with Housing Link and their Beyond Backgrounds program and Ujama Place.

So the program targeted young black males, 18 to 30 in particular, to support their transition to housing.

And finally, the goal of this pilot program was also to identify ways to mitigate perceived risks for landlords.

So the one of the hypothesis that this sort of collaborative had was that landlords may be hesitant to house folks with backgrounds because they may have take a financial loss through either unpaid rent or damages or things like that.

And so the program set up what they called sort of a housing fund for landlords that they could access if they were willing to house folks in the program.

So those are sort of the three prongs of the program.

So I'm going to kind of skip right to some of our findings.

So we partnered with the city of St.

Paul with Ujama and Housing Link to evaluate the program.

So we came in sort of halfway through, and the goal was for us to interview all participants of the program, all the landlords of the program and program staff as well.

So the goal of returning home St.

Paul was 20 participants.

Participant recruitment was very challenging.

And so each member of the sort of collaborative encountered various challenges, really connecting with and recruiting participants.

And in the end, there were 12 total participants housed through the program, 10 of those housed in St.

Paul.

So the two that found housing in Minneapolis were not sort of followed through the rest of the program.

So at the end of one year, six of the participants graduated, that is, they were they remained in housing for a year, and five of those six re-signed their leases.

So four of the participants, so 40%, nearly half, exited the program early.

So two were from mutual terminations from housing and two were from eviction.

So it was a challenging process and program, and there was a lot of learning that happened with the folks who were involved.

There were a total of nine landlords that ended up housing participants through this process, but the interested pool that Housing Link in particular built throughout this process was about 53 landlords.

So they were able to bring interested landlords into the fold who said they had an interest in housing folks with backgrounds.

And at the end, 70% of participants housed in St.

Paul didn't have any additional criminal legal system involvement while enrolled, but and of those 30% that did, there were no new felonies.

So a lot of it was technical violations.

So that was a big goal of the program too, supporting folks through housing and not re-funding.

Financially by the numbers, so the program had financial support for participants for application fees and for security deposits or first month rent.

So that was the only sort of financial support that was offered.

And so several participant access those financial supports and the process.

And then the access fund, the housing fund for landlords, should they need to access it.

Nobody accessed it.

None of the landlords ended up coming to access any of that money.

So you know, we can sort of draw several conclusions for this.

Either they didn't need it, they weren't aware of it, or a combination of both.

When we looked at participant experience, so we interviewed participants throughout the process.

I've got a lot more data on this, and we have a larger report on our website I can direct folks to.

But participant experiences were particularly powerful for those individuals who identified as fathers, and those are the most successful.

So being able to feel hopeful, supported, and especially increased sense of stability was really important for folks who were able to make it through the program.

And even for those who ended up terminating their leases early, they felt that while they were able to access housing and get support in doing so, they felt a sense of hopes and stability.

However, as you saw by the numbers, there were continued barriers.

So you know, it was a it was a pilot program, they were experimenting with different ways to house folks.

And some of the big takeaways from both partners and participants and landlords were the continued barriers to not just searching for housing, which was challenging, but also securing and then maintaining housing.

So folks talk often about job instability, they needed to be able to keep jobs in order to pay rent, and that was really challenging.

This was the pilot program went from December 2020 through I think they the last participant was enrolled in early 2022, so this was sort of in the heart of COVID-19, and so that provided a lot of challenges for housing.

And then several participants and landlords named whether it applied to them or not.

Some landlords thought that that the eight to ten year look back policy for folks with criminal histories couldn't be housed.

Some landlords found out that that was actually not a policy that applied to them, but they thought it might.

And so that was named frequently from participants and from landlords as a barrier for housing.

But at the end of the day, the biggest continued barrier, even for folks who secured housing, was being able to maintain that housing financially.

So nearly all of the participants struggled to pay their rent on time.

The pilot provided financial assistance for getting and securing housing, that security deposit and application fees, but not for rent throughout the course of the year, and almost everybody had trouble paying rent.

Some of the learn learnings from landlords.

So this this pilot really showed, and you know, we had a lot of interesting discussions among the whole collaborative that the sort of initial hypothesis that if we can offer this housing mitigation funds to bring landlords into the fold who might have been, you know, perceive a risk with housing folks with backgrounds in the past, but maybe would have tried it, actually didn't pan out.

Every single landlord who participated in this program already had a history of housing people with backgrounds.

So we didn't really bring new landlords into the fold.

Instead, we were able to tap folks who said, I already would have been willing.

This is nice now that I might have access to this fund or support, but it wasn't sort of a changing of hearts and minds that happened with this program.

Um a big learning for um the partners were that recruitment was a real challenge, especially limiting geography.

So the program was limited to landlords and uh residents of St.

Paul, and they found so many folks begin the process of housing, but then identify a place to live outside of the city, um, and then they were not eligible for the program as a result.

And so people were really transient, not surprisingly, and so as a result, people were had a hard time recruiting and keeping participants in the program to be housed in St.

Paul.

In addition, Housing Link had lots of interested landlords, but outside of the city of St.

Paul.

So that geographic restriction made things really challenging.

And then finally, um, perhaps not surprisingly, the housing markets in particular at that time moved really fast.

And so Ujama, Housing Link and the City learned a lot about um really deepening uh collaborative partnerships from city entities and community-based organizations.

There were a lot of learnings that are in our longer report about how to really sort of like work together and work fast when you're trying to support people who are returning home, both sort of from the city side and also from you know Ujama side with case management and support and housing.

So our recommendations at the end of this small pilot really align with those findings.

So, first, we found that it was absolutely necessary to build additional wraparound support and particular financial rental assistance for programs.

If there's going to be a housing program in order to secure housing, maintaining housing is necessary and fine and being able to pay rent was really challenging to people.

So, thinking about if we're thinking about the sort of financial, we had a lot of conversations about if that 30 or that $3,000 risk fund could be used or shifted to support folks to stay in housing and be able to pay rent.

In some ways, that does go to the landlord, right?

So there were some conversations and learnings about shifting the kinds of financial support necessary.

Second, increasing the pipeline of participants for the program.

So again, really trying to make sure that maybe not just partnering with one community-based work like Ujama.

There was a lot of conversations about going directly to the DOC for folks on re-entry and going to other community-based orgs to really open up the pipeline of participants, especially if that geography is limited.

Third, shifting to targeted landlord outreach.

So this was a big learning from this pilot project that rather than trying to at least at the beginning expand the pool of landlords who will rent to folks with backgrounds, identifying those landlords who are already potentially willing or already have in the past and supporting those folks to be able to continue to do that.

We heard a lot from landlords, you know, I'm I'm okay with it, but I don't have the resources, or I'm not connected with housing link to find people who might need housing.

So we strongly recommended shifted shifting to a more targeted landlord outreach process to really maxi maximize that pool of interested landlords.

And then, as I mentioned, the sort of collaboration among organizations and government was really important, and so we recommended establishing and supporting those relationships between program partners in particular.

Finally, when it came to policy changes, um, sorry.

Just had a uh a question from um Council Coleman.

Thank you so much, Terry.

Thank you.

This is a really interesting presentation.

I just wanted to ask quickly on the targeted landlord outreach.

Um I find it very interesting that there were so many more interested landlords than were, and also it was difficult for people to stay in their housing due to affordability.

And I'm curious if we have any information about the affordability of the unit units that the landlords were offering.

Were those market rate were they deeply affordable, affordable?

It's a really good question.

Um for this particular project, we did not we did not have any findings about the the rent that people paid.

Um I imagine that housing link has so housing link has a database of landlords, and so housing link is able to sort of like organize those um units by price.

So Housing Link has a database of landlords, and so Housing Link is able to sort of like organize those units by price.

So it could be it's a question we could answer, I guess is the short answer.

But we didn't look at the differences in rents for folks who participate in the program.

I will say that they the recruitment process for participants with Ujama place also was coupled with um place had um like it's um life coaching and case management about sort of financial management, and so um knowing what the rent was going to be and making sure that that rent was affordable and accessible was part of the process, but I don't have numbers.

It's a good question though.

Thank you.

Other questions?

Thank you.

Okay.

So just the the last recommendations again, one of the things that we heard from participants in particular, but also from landlords was if we can eliminate existing barriers.

So two of the barriers that folks mentioned um quite regularly were that there were a handful of harder to how harder to how harder to house offenses, so offenses for which folks would be automatically denied housing.

And so being able to look into those offenses and um remove that that automatic denial barrier so that landlords could then house folks.

And then, secondly, again, this eight to ten year look back periods.

Now, these policy changes, you know, these recommendations are three years old now.

So at the time, this was something that um the city was looking into shifting, and so that's um where these policy recommendations come from.

So I think.

Oh, so the last slide.

Um, so again, part of our our our small pilot um, you know, evaluation of this program was really about participant experiences and trying to learn from those.

So I just end with a quote from one participant um who said that the overarching story of this returning home St.

Paul this small program was of hope and inspiration.

So really identifying for a small group of folks who are able to connect with these supports.

Um there was an extra reason to know you're doing the right thing and to keep doing the right thing.

It changed my life's perspective.

So we so we know both from the research and experience that access to housing for those who can secure and maintain it can be really life-changing, and we saw that happen with the program for folks who were housed.

Okay.

So I kind of sped through slides, but I'm happy to take questions or talk more about workcomes.

Go on.

Thank you.

Just one additional question.

Is there is the study entirely complete, or is there any long-term work of the participants or any tracking being done?

Yeah, no, it's it's entirely to my so certainly from from our sort of as an evaluation partner.

Um, you know, we wrapped up uh two years ago or so, I think and mid-2022.

Um, so but I'm and uh and then I know that like you know, staff has shifted.

In fact, it's some of the some of the staff who were at Udama when we did this program are now working at the city of St.

at the city in the Office of Neighborhood Safety.

So it's been fun to sort of watch watch boats' trajectories.

Um so I don't think so.

I won't say for certain that there's no long-term follow-up, but that was not part of the original project.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

And then also um to your question, um, Councilmember Coleman.

Um, this was a uh uh a partnership between the city of St.

Paul, Office of Financial Empowerment, uh really ran this program.

Um, the director and the program, um, a manager uh or coordinator for it is no longer um work for the city of St.

Paul, but there's still strong partners, there's still strong advocates.

Um the reason why I brought this back is for us to explore if we want to continue this pilot, um, like was um given before in the presentation, it was just about 12 participants.

So council can you know re-explore if we want to continue this um and talk with our department heads, particularly Office of Financial Empowerment or another department that has interests with continuing this on, but I don't have any questions.

I do want to just say I appreciate um clarifying these recommendations.

I know um for someone who uh live in Ward One and have uh quite a few of the communities who are just as impacted.

Um, this uh program was transformational.

Um, this program was life-changing and allowed for people to have access to housing in ways that we don't normally see um from the from the city um or even from the county or the state.

So I'm um um happy to get a refresher on this and um also have the conversations, particularly around how our resources and our existing programs, whether it's the rental assistance, um, can also be applied to to these uh uh to our communities, you know, that's impacted.

Uh but thank you.

With further ado, we're going to um transition.

Um we have a really tight schedule here.

Um we're gonna be working some miracles with the time, but I'm gonna bring up our deputy director Beth Commerce um to um speak to the uh chapter 183 good afternoon, Chair.

My name is Beth Commerce, I'm the deputy director in the Department of Human Rights and Equal Economic Opportunity.

It's a bit of a mouthful.

Uh, we go by our acronym H R E O, otherwise referred to as HERO.

Um, you did invite me um to speak, invite us to speak about our human rights ordinance.

So I will do that.

I always take a minute to level set um and talk about the department as a whole.

On the screen, you can see our mission statement.

Um we have human rights investigators, we have uh our accessibility coordinator for the Americans with Disabilities Act and language access.

Complaints of police misconduct is coordinated through our department.

We have an excellent small business certification program for all of the small business owners that's referred to as the CERT program.

Um procurement, everything the city buys and sells runs through our team of buyers.

Labor standards investigations, minimum wage, wage theft, earned second safe time, and I went ahead and added prevailing wage to that instead of putting it as a separate item.

So we're a really unique department.

We do a lot of different things.

I don't think I need to show all of you this, but we um our ordinances apply for the in the jurisdiction of the city.

Now, chapter 183 is the human rights law, the city's human rights ordinance, and you can see on the screen that we can investigate allegations of discrimination in the following areas education, employment, housing, which is also known as real property, public accommodations.

Uh so if you were going to Starbucks and buying a latte, for example, that would be that kind of scenario.

Public services, uh, credit business and reprisal, also known as retaliation.

There is a one-year statute of limitations uh period to file a charge of discrimination from the alleged incident uh that someone believes discrimination may have occurred.

And the next slide shows you our existing protected classes.

Um I'm not going to bore you and read them out loud for you because there are many.

Uh, but just so you know, all of our protected classes are on the screen.

It's chapter 183.

I did bring um copies of our handout.

Our manager actually put this together.

It's pretty terrific.

Um, it's in several languages, so I'll leave that here and then swing back later and grab what's left over.

Okay.

Umtact information.

Do you have any questions?

Any questions at all?

Great.

Thank you for that uh review of the of the policy.

Uh it's really important that we level set on what our existing policy is, and you know, as council members, you know, we can always follow up with that ordinance um and look do a deeper dive into that um in uh in another setting.

But thank you so much, Director Commons for Commerce uh for your for your resources and also your education.

We're going to um transition to our our coalition partners here, uh uh Paul Sullivan as well as Maurice uh Ward uh to speak particularly around the justice impacted status as a protected class um around uh their their work in Minneapolis and across the nation.

So without further ado, just going to hand it off to you both.

Thank you so much, council members, for hearing us today.

Um, as um Councilman Bowie said, um, my name is Paul Sullivan.

I'm an organizer with the ACLU of Minnesota.

Um founder of Josh.

Uh we're here today representing the Justice Equity Coalition, which is a coalition that came together to try to um promote justice impacted status as a protected class, first in the city of Minneapolis and now in St.

Paul and starting um in a few other cities across the state.

Um, just this is sort of the core committee of us.

Um I believe we're all present.

Uh that also includes other organizations along with the ACLU and Jive.

Um we also have Nell Rivers with the New Justice Project and Daniel Matthias with uh Minnesota Freedom Fund.

Um and Maurice gonna get a little bit of background on what got us to where we are today.

What happened?

Um the reason why we're here right now is uh as I came home from doing um eight and a half, nine years, I realized that the um I faced obstacles that were collateral consequences, didn't have terminology for it initially, just knew there was discrimination uh that was everybody knew existed, but nobody was doing anything about.

So um I went through um just dealing with it like most of us do, you know, just trying to maintain, trying to find a job, trying to find employment, trying to maintain it.

But I I listened to all the noise around me about how individuals going back and how we're recidiveness was so high, but they're we're they were not um talking about the real reasons why and the real reasons why we face um so many other obstacles that keeps keep us from achieving um you know our full potential.

But there were they were not talking about the real reasons why and the real reasons why we face so many other obstacles that keeps keep us from our full potential.

I think one of my most surreal moments was being in my house and feeling like I could not be the father or provider because of my criminal background.

And it was embarrassing.

So with that being said, um, with the right to vote was established, um, we formed Jive, which is an acronym for justice impact individuals voting effectively.

Um we took uh we formed and we formed the Justice Equity Coalition.

We were fortunate to find champions in Minneapolis who have um passed that amendment to their uh Bill of Rights, but we were also have a national coalition um with bar business out of um Alana, and um we've uh been pushing to make justice impacted individuals a protective class because we know identity of this power.

So uh the core values are all individuals have the right to be forgiven, makes all make sense.

All individuals have the right to live free from sanctions and excess.

Um the the prevalence of de facto sanctions imposed by society upon justice back to individuals the creations of laws to protect these individuals from societal sanctions without due process, and that's just common sense.

Yep.

So our first step to this was um linking up with some members of the same uh Minneapolis City Council.

We were fortunate enough to cooperate um with um the office of council member Robin Wansley and the council um council member Jason Chavez.

Um and our timing was also incredibly fortunate because they were already working on an amendment to the protected class ordinances, and we were able to bundle um justice impacted status together with new protections for um housing status and for height and weight.

Um so it took about a year all together um to get the language figured out, to go through the proper processes, um, and then ultimately the language that they ended up on, um, which I thought would be worth including for reference here is how they define justice impacted status is the state of having a criminal record or history, including arrest, charge, conviction, period of incarceration, or past or current probationary status.

Now, how that has rolled out in the approval and implementation process, um, it passed unanimously.

Um, we had a hearing very similar to this one, um, and then a second one where we were able to actually we went into overflow room for uh the city council chambers with supporters.

Um and what it does is that you know, like all of the protected classes, there are various areas that it protects, specifically on this list.

Um, the areas that um justice impacted status now is protected in our education, employment, professional organizations, property rights, and public accommodations.

So, not the entire list, but it is certainly a strong start, and it certainly goes a long way to start addressing some of these issues.

Um we've been in continued meetings with the city of Minneapolis about what implementation will look like.

Um the um new protected classes went into effect uh August 1st of this year.

Um, and the city has been working um their investigations in human rights department has been working on um doing a lot of outreach.

Um we actually just yesterday sat in on a know your rights presentation by that office um that gave us some um really amazing scenarios to people that people could walk through to kind of elucidate where do these lines lie for like what counts as an infringement on this new protected class or not.

Um and yeah, really it's the I didn't want to come up here and bore you all with you know all of the minutia of the exact you know how the process works, but essentially the idea, especially for areas like employment and um for housing is that it shifts the burden from the person who's applying to the person who is hiring or giving somebody housing.

So instead of saying, oh, you have a record, you you know, you have some sort of criminal history, we're just not gonna hire you, or um, we're gonna have some sort of adverse decision when it comes to housing simply based off of that.

Instead, now there's a nexus of various factors that employers have to consider um that landlords have to consider to say, why is it relevant that you have this status?

Um it's not just that you have the status.

Um, and of course, this is exempted by you know state law, by federal law.

There are certain positions that this doesn't apply to, like jobs that work with children, um, like law enforcement.

Um, but in general, the idea is that it makes it so that you no longer have to just say, Oh, you have a you have a felony, can't give you this job, can't give you this apartment.

It shifts that burden, um, if that makes sense.

Um yeah, Maurice is gonna talk a little bit about the the national context of what we're doing.

So umce we um formalized this and started working, we reached out to a national coalition.

Um, and I mean I'm actually having a meeting with this with them this afternoon.

Um you can see the different areas or the different places who have passed Allanna, Georgia, Gainesville, Florida, Minneapolis being one.

Um also just recently, New Orleans just passed uh um Fair Chance Act is very comprehensive.

Um Augusta is looking at passing something.

Baltimore is looking at the state of uh Illinois is doing some very comprehensive uh things.

Um what we're trying to do is um make justice impact the individuals or protect the status and let individuals understand that um we are a vulnerable class of individuals that need protection, and we've been working as a coalition to make that happen.

Um and I feel like it's worth noting, you know, things are moving incredibly fast nationally with this.

The fact that you know I wasn't even able to get you know New Orleans changed from black to red because you know we just found out about that, you know, yesterday is I think speaks to the salience to this moment.

Um now, lastly, I'm gonna not gonna dwell too much on this, but why is this necessary?

Um before you go to that point, we just have a question or a comment from Councilmember Joe's.

I think you should be um could uh I was looking at the map that you just shared.

Are you are there any cities um on the West Coast where this is in process, or are there any the different state laws there or something, or is there a reason why?

Not to our knowledge.

Um I'm not and I I can't necessarily speak to why the geography has rolled out the way that it has.

Um, but this is you know from the coalition that we've worked with, these are the cities that have you know initiated processes to have ordinances like that.

Really, yeah, I'm not I'm not entirely sure why the West Coast hasn't.

Um to clarify also is that the network that we're in, um we aren't in communication.

We don't know if there's actually something going on currently because we we're um it's not we're a smaller network, it's just that um we we tend to communicate and and build grassroots through grassroots, right?

I found out about barred business because they had passed um some legislation, and I was able to talk to the um the council member who uh authored that or uh was the champion of that, and that connected me to Illinois, to Baltimore, to all the other areas.

Um, so it's just uh we don't know what the process is currently in that area.

We just know what's going on right now in our little network.

Okay, thank you.

Yes.

Um I won't belabor this point too much since you know we've already had fantastic speakers from MNJRC um talk about you know, why is this necessary?

But in short, it's just as impacted individuals are an incredibly vulnerable population in our society today.

Um 65% of them are unemployed at the four-year mark, and it is often due to barriers like this.

Um, you know, we also see you know incredibly high rates of homelessness, like once again, in part due to the fact that you know it's legal for landlords to be able to discriminate based on simply having a record.

Um in our coalition, we talk about a lot of these things as sort of like uh a second hidden sentence.

You know, there's the sentence that's handed down to you by a court of law that is you know, through a jury of your peers.

Um, and then there's this one that is you know, ad hoc haphazard applied by society.

And the end result is that people really are not able to reliably get the housing or the jobs that they need, um, which severely severely limits things like reintegration and severely worsens recidivism.

It really kind of turns into a you know a tragedy of the commons situation because yes, we want these people to reintegrate, but for some reason people don't want to give them the the jobs or housing that they need to do that.

Um lastly, um, and I think for the sake of time, we said that um you you already give a little bit of your testimony.

We're gonna have um Alessandra Elleray, who is uh Justice Impacted individual from um the Twin Cities um testify on her experiences um in this area.

So I think the teams link is we good perfect.

All right.

Hi everyone, thanks for having me.

Um my name is Alessandra, I live in the Twin Cities.

Um so I will just start off with talking about like how earlier this year I was turned down by an apartment after I was told based on my record that I was not able that I was going to be able to have the apartment.

They said, Oh, we should be able to get through that, everything's fine.

Um, and I then was turned down three years ago before I got into this apartment.

I was homeless um and I was seeking housing.

I had a job at 1800 detox.

I was turned down for housing based on this this certain crime being pending.

Um I also used to work for DHS jobs where I was a CPRS through um working working with individuals who who were in recovery.

I was a supervisor at a group home for years, and also at 1800 detox.

Um so the barriers that have inhibited me from being the best I can be are is housing that is offered only in high crime ridden areas, which also reduces the chance for for recovery and restoration and reducing recidivism.

Um the crime that I committed was an act of self-defense, and it's made my life a lot harder to navigate.

It has impacted me through jobs, through, you know, speaking with people, you know, about this experience.

It's a very it's a it's a cloud that lingers over um my head.

So uh with having justice impacted people as a protective class, this opens up the opportunity to seek, you know, career different careers.

This opens up the opportunity to to receive housing that accommodates like what I what I believe I deserve.

Um it opens up unlimited opportunities to be able to serve the people that I care about.

Um thank you.

All right.

Um thank you once again, Alessandra.

Um, and I think then that is all for our presentation.

Um, if there are any questions, we welcome them now.

I do have a quick question, and I'm I'm looking for my other colleagues to have some questions.

Um, particularly you're talking about the uh Minneapolis had their own definition of justice impacted status.

Is that just like a universal universal uh definition that other cities have adopted, or has there been no difference in how uh cities define justice impacted communities?

My understanding is that um every city, you know, when you're writing the laws, it's not going to be a cut and paste exactly every single time.

Um but my understanding is that they did look at, for example, um Atlanta's ordinance um very heavily when they were crafting the definition for justice impacted individuals in Minneapolis.

So while it's you know it's gonna be different around the edges every single time that the gist of it is generally pretty close to what we see in Minneapolis.

Thank you.

Councilman call me.

Thank you.

I just want to say I do have a question, but first just want to say a huge thanks to Chairbowie for starting this conversation today.

I'm really grateful that we're having it.

And to Mr.

Sullivan and Mr.

Ward, thanks so much for being here.

I really you know so much of this feels so important, but I really am sitting with sort of the second sentence um framing and the notion that we have a system, like it or not.

We have a system that we have delegated the authority to to issue punishments for people's actions, and then this notion that we as individuals are members of our society have the right to arbitrarily make up our own additional punishments feels feels completely backwards, and I'm I'm just very glad that we're having this conversation.

To get to my question, um, and it's along similar lines.

You mentioned Mr.

Sullivan that there were some places where the Minneapolis ordinance maybe didn't do everything that you all had hoped for.

I'm just curious if there were sort of things that you all were fighting for that you would have liked to see look different in that.

Sorry, could you repeat?

Yeah, I thought you mentioned when we were on slide five that um there were a couple of protected areas that maybe you all had wanted covered that weren't covered by the Minneapolis ordinance or any other changes that you all had hoped to see there, but maybe I misunderstood.

Okay, good.

Please, yeah.

Um I just think because the state is a preemptive state.

The problem is not with the city as much as with is with us going to the state and getting some of the the barriers that the state has established removed.

Although we um uh the Minneapolis uh ordinance was comprehensive, there's still barriers that it um um Minnesota Department of Health can over, you know, even say even um the second look or um uh other there's other carve outs they have that they you uh uh use, but um because of the state statute, it it has these lifetime bars on specifically the healthcare industry, where individuals want to work and have no crimes that are even close to that and they can't get into it.

Um and some uh they have a second, what is it, a second chance or second look or uh second?

It's uh where the employer can actually um pull you aside and give you um say I want this employee because of the background, you know, because I know they have the experience that the state supersedes that.

So that's not even a carve out.

So we need to make justice impacted individuals a protective class because we're getting into a lot of areas that um uh individuals are qualified to work in, but they can't because DHS or background study comes back that prehib prohibit prohibits them from working.

So got it, thank you.

Well, I think a lot that was said today is deeply resonating with me.

Um, you know, before I was on the council, uh I've met many of you all and been in relationship with many of you all um organizing on restore the vote and um how this is very similar um to um um re-enfranchising um a community that has been you know deemed to second class citizenship um and uh making sure that we are having a community that can exercise all of their rights um and voting rights is just one aspect of someone's life that we want to make sure that people have access to housing to employment um and like what you mentioned um Mr.

Ward, um dignity, right?

Dignity in their in the communities and their families.

So um, you know, I'm committed to this.

I think this is a really great uh presentation overview um for us to explore, you know, what action that the council wants to take.

Um but you um also I encourage you all to connect with council members, have these conversations out in community um and to build that coalition.

So but thank you so much for your time.

And uh we're gonna transition real shortly here.

We have um our last speaker, Neil Rivers.

Um, and I asked Neil Rivers particularly that uh I know a lot been has been said, particularly around the advocacy on this, that uh if you uh uh can help all of us be um done by uh 155, so that gives you about like four minutes.

Um and my apologies for you know, I know this uh this conversation or your presentation could be an entire you know seminar, um, but we just want to make sure we had a chance to hear from you today.

Yeah, thank you so much.

Thank you, council members.

I'll make this really quick.

Um it only supports the previous presentations anyway.

So get started.

Oh yes.

Thanks, Beth.

Yeah, I mean which one I hear this one.

I wish we can voice activate the pre-change slides.

Oh, I don't see my presentation here.

Um do we not this one?

We have is it we have a one-pager, but we don't have the uh presentation.

Yeah, this the presentation I guess isn't um yeah, isn't it here?

Okay, our apologies.

I I think um we have the Polly's looking into it right now.

Um but what we have received particularly was this one pager.

Um we want to give us a quick second to look through it.

Okay.

Um were you must be that one right there?

Yeah.

No, this is different from it.

So okay.

I think there might be some technical difficulties, particularly around getting what we have is a one-pager, but Polly can bring it over there and and confirm with you if that's your presentation.

Just want to make sure I know we're running up to time, so maybe you should give us some right.

Yeah, I think we're gonna just wanna she just had one slide.

That's why I was just okay.

Okay, so we're uh we'll just move forward with um if you can just give the overview because what we have received, um at least what we have attached um on the agenda is just the one pager.

Sure.

Um but we can also could we we can um talk offline particularly around what are other ways to re-engage um the council members on this information.

So but our apologies for um the the technical difficulties one is really important to make sure that we have all the accurate information um posted online so we will make sure to get that posted after this committee meeting.

Yeah, of course.

Um so I can kind of walk through the Fair Chance uh Housing Act.

So it's comprised of uh new justice projects, so that's who I'm representing today.

Um I'm the campaign impacted learning coordinator, um, Vera Institute, which is a uh justice and research uh policy tank, they're national, and then uh UWAAF, which is United Umtil We Are All Free.

So that's three organizations that are um supporting the Fair Chance um Housing Act.

Um so basically it's um as we heard earlier in the presentations, there is a need for um housing protections for justice impacted folks.

So the hope with this uh fair chance amendment or housing act is to address uh the discrimination that many of them face.

Um it would put the the burden on the landlord instead of on the just as impacted individual on proving why they um can't rent at that location or can't have that housing.

Um so that's like kind of the gist of it.

Um any questions at all we have today.

And Polly, thank you so much for for being a rock star and trying to make it work.

Um welcome to the city process, everyone.

Um but um we are uh we had heard a lot and I really appreciate the the the breadth of um this conversation and all the different aspects um that uh residents you know are faced with some barriers, and you know we have a lot um for us to explore around you know solving those those those barriers and addressing who should you know receive those protections and um how our protections um can actually be more expansive to the needs um and some of the issues that we have heard today.

So without further ado, um we're going to to adjourn this meeting.

Um I welcome you all to the next community uh meeting um next month.

I know that's gonna fall around Thanksgiving week, so oh that one has or excuse me, that one has been canceled um due to be on Thanksgiving.

So without further ado, we are gonna adjourn this meeting.