Raising wages for human services workers not only is beneficial to those individuals; it is also a strategic policy intervention with far-reaching benefits for communities and the broader economy.

As New York City’s General Election approaches, we’re taking a closer look at the role of local government in NYC and the ways that community-based organizations can increase civic engagement in communities where voter turnout has historically been low.  

The Fellows will embed in local organizations for the next two years to develop strategies for empowering and uplifting the voices of Bronx community members in local elections.

Summer job reports show that human services and state and local government are among the fastest-hiring sectors. But many of these jobs lag behind in wage growth. Our analysis of New York State charts a path for policymakers and other leaders to create a pipeline of quality, sustainable public services.

“The folks behind the scenes are the majority of the people working in city politics. There's only 51 council members in New York City, but each council member has a team of 7 to 10 people. So now we're talking about hundreds of people that are advocating for constituents. It's an army of people who care.”

Travis brings an unmatched breadth of experience in criminal justice policy, research, and reform, and in leadership roles across government, academia, philanthropy, and nonprofit organizations.

The cohort of CUNY ISLG interns will work hands-on with the research, policy, data science, legal, and operations teams, as well as participate in discussions with subject matter experts across a number of pressing issue areas.

A year after launch, ISLG convened the 16 Community-Based Restorative Justice initiative grantees to celebrate the work being done on the ground, as well as the training and technical assistance experts who’ve provided support along the way and the funders who can keep the work going.

The Request-for-Proposal (RFP) and other parts of grantmaking often leave out smaller, grassroots community organizations who are closest to those they serve. Using our Community-Based Restorative Justice Program and Grassroots Policy Incubator as examples, we dig into ways that funders and grant managers can create a more inclusive process that uplifts new ideas without sacrificing program quality and accountability.

For the fourth year in a row, an analysis of individual-level jail data and county-level crime trends assessing the relationship between pretrial release and crime affirms past findings: violent crime and the rate that people returned to jail after release have remained the same before and after reforms were implemented. 

“My goal is to ensure everything is moving—and if there are roadblocks, I spot it long before anybody else in the team, so that I can rearrange things and clear them. My role is to be strategic, a problem solver, and a project manager all at once.”

“Staff in legislative offices are there to give their constituents support, especially when the world seems on fire. These are the people that have a hose to help put out those fires—sometimes, they may be the smallest of fires, but they're putting out a fire.”