The Writing on the Wall: Take Action

Learn how organizations are leading the push to end mass incarceration and advocating for the communities most impacted. In conjunction with the installation of The Writing on the Wall, criminal justice reform organizations will be stationed at information-sharing tables in the 14th Street Passage. Additionally, at 12pm and 1pm, public tours of the installation will be led by Devon Simmons and Matthew Wilson, two graduates of John Jay College’s Prison-to-College Pipeline program. RSVPs are encouraged but not required for the tours, and no sign up is necessary for the info tables.

Participating groups include:
We Got Us Now
A national movement built by, led by, and about children and young adults impacted by parental incarceration. Their mission is to engage, educate, elevate, and empower this historically invisible population through the use of digital narratives, safe and inclusive spaces, and advocacy-led campaigns that ensure these voices are at the forefront of strategic initiatives, practices, and policies that will help to keep families connected, create fair sentencing, and end mass incarceration.

The Bail Project
The Bail Project is a national nonprofit with the mission to combat mass incarceration by reshaping the pretrial system in the U.S. Their community-based teams provide free bail assistance to thousands of people every year and support them with court notifications, advocacy, and voluntary referrals to local partners for additional services, including housing, treatment, and job readiness. In addition, The Bail Project gathers data and stories to support the work of grassroots movements for bail reform and decarceration. Through these efforts, they seek to transform pretrial justice for generations of Americans to come, bringing us one step closer to ending mass incarceration and racial and economic disparities in the U.S. criminal legal system.

Common Justice
Common Justice develops and advances solutions to violence that transform the lives of those harmed and that foster racial equity without relying on incarceration. They operate the first alternative-to-incarceration and victim-service program in the United States that focuses on violent felonies in the adult courts. In addition, they leverage the lessons from their direct service to transform the justice system on a national scale through partnerships, advocacy, and elevating the experience and power of those most impacted.

Midtown Community Court and the Center for Court Innovation
The Center for Court Innovation grew out of a single experiment, the Midtown Community Court, which was created in 1993 to address low-level crime around Times Square. Instead of fines or short-term jail, the court provides individualized responses that are restorative to the community and participants. The court also works with neighborhood stakeholders to improve Midtown Manhattan. The project’s success in reducing both crime and incarceration led to establishing the Center for Court Innovation to serve as an ongoing engine for justice reform. The Center creates operating programs to test new ideas and solve problems, performs original research to determine what works (and what doesn’t), and provides expert assistance to justice reformers around the world.