Page 8 The Skanner January 31, 2018
News
Rep. Danny Davis (D-Illinois) Introduces Bail Reform Bill
Davis’ bill seeks to alleviate some of the financial burdens and inequities associated with money bail
rest is now $10,000, while
the Federal Reserve has
found that nearly half of
Americans would be un-
By Lauren Victoria
Burke (NNPA Newswire
Contributor)
“
FREDDIE ALLEN/AMG/NNPA
D
uring a recent
press conference
on Capitol Hill,
Rep. Danny Davis
(D-Ill.) said that at any
given time there are
roughly 500,000 people
sitting in local jails wait-
ing for their day in court.
“These are people
who have been charged
with a crime, but are
not convicted,” said Da-
vis. “Many of the people
waiting in jail are forced
to wait, simply because
they cannot afford to
post bail.”
On January 18, Davis
introduced the Bail Fair-
ness Act of 2018 to allevi-
ate some of the burdens
associated with the cash
bail system.
The Chicago congress-
man was joined on Cap-
itol Hill by Reps. Sheila
Jackson Lee (D-Texas)
and Dwight Evans (D-Pa.)
and Chicago business-
man and philanthro-
pist Dr. Willie Wilson.
The four of them were
flanked by two large
posters; one poster read:
“Taxpayers Spend $17
billion on Pre-trial De-
tentions”; the other post-
er simply said, “Bail Fail”
in large letters. Wilson
said that he has paid the
bails of non-violent Cook
County Corrections in-
mates who were too poor
to bail themselves out.
Davis’
legislation
would require states
Rep. Danny Davis (D-Ill.) recently held a press conference to introduce
the “Bail Fairness Act of 2018” on Capitol Hill.
to release individuals
charged with a non-vi-
olent misdemeanor on
non-monetary
condi-
tions prior to their court
date.
Civil rights groups and
lawmakers are increas-
ingly putting pressure
on businesses operating
in the cash bail system
and becoming more vo-
cal about problems in the
industry.
As more cities begin
to do away with the cash
bail practice, some feder-
al legislators are taking
notice. Senators Kama-
la Harris (D-Calif.) and
Cory Booker (D-N.J.) have
voiced similar concerns
regarding the problems
of money bail in the Sen-
ate. In September 2017,
Harris joined with Re-
publican Senator Rand
Paul (R-Ky.) on the Pre-
trial Integrity and Safe-
ty Act. The bill would
overhaul America’s bail
system just as Rep. Davis’
legislation hopes to do.
A May 2017 report by
Color of Change and the
ACLU entitled, “Selling
Off Our Freedom: How
Insurance Corporations
Have Taken Over Our
Bail System,” outlined
the for-profit incentives
behind the bail system in
America.
The report revealed
that there are fewer
than 10 companies in-
volved in the adminis-
tration of over $14 bil-
lion in bonds posted
by for-profit bail each
year. The bail industry
collects approximately
$2 billion in profit, an-
nually.
“The result of bail
corporations’ control
is that millions of peo-
ple are no longer free:
people stuck in jail and
families stuck in debt to
create profit for these
corporations,” the re-
port read. The study
also pointed out that,
“the national median
for bail for a felony ar-
of bail was to serve as
an incentive to return
to court when a person
is arrested, released,
Many of the people waiting
in jail are forced to wait
simply, because they cannot
afford to post bail
able to pay for an unex-
pected expense of $400.”
The United States re-
mains number one in
the world in the rate of
incarceration, with over
two million people be-
hind bars, in large part,
because poor people are
unable to pay their way
out of incarceration. The
money bail system dis-
proportionately impacts
the poor. There are cur-
rently over 43 million
Americans living under
the poverty line; nearly
30 percent of African
Americans live in pov-
erty.
“The original purpose
and their case proceeds.
However, the current
money bail system has
little to do with this orig-
inal intent…people with
money can almost always
buy their way to free-
dom, regardless of the
charges against them,”
wrote ACLU Deputy Na-
tional Political Director
Udi Ofer on December 11,
2017.
Rep. Davis has contin-
ued to focus on justice
reform issues during his
20 years in Congress. Da-
vis’ “Second Chance Act”
was signed into law by
President George W.
Bush in 2007. The legis-
lation assisted formerly
incarcerated individuals
to successfully re-enter
society.
In November 2016,
after his 15-year-old
grandson was murdered
in Chicago, Rep. Davis
pushed for more funding
for neighborhoods strug-
gling with poverty. His
focus was on the “10-20-
30” policy proposed by
South Carolina Rep. Jim
Clyburn. The “10-20-30”
plan would focus cash on
10 percent of all govern-
ment funding to be allo-
cated to areas where 20
percent of the residents
have lived in poverty for
over 30 years.
Lauren Victoria Burke
is an independent jour-
nalist, political analyst
and contributor to the
NNPA Newswire and
BlackPressUSA.com. She
can be reached by email
at
LBurke007@gmail.
com and on Twitter at @
LVBurke.
Chicago Public Schools Working to
Close Achievement Gap
Students in Chicago Public Schools Learning Faster
than their Peers
By Stacy M. Brown
(NNPA Newswire Con-
tributor)
S
tudents in the
Chicago
Public
Schools (CPS) sys-
tem are learning
faster than just about
A career you can
be proud of.
Being a carpenter isn’t just a job. It’s a way of life. We’re
devoted to strengthening the lives of our members with
steady work, wealth and personal growth.
We take a stand for our members and all workers. We
work together to lead the building industry in safety,
training and compensation. We create rich lives for our
members and partners.
To learn more about becoming a union carpenter, go to
NWCarpenters.org.
PORTLAND:
1636 East Burnside, Portland, OR 97214 | 503.261.1862
HEADQUARTERS:
25120 Pacific Hwy S, #200, Kent, WA 98032 | 253.954.8800
More than 20,000 members in the Pacific Northwest.
any other school district
in the nation, according
to new research.
Research provided by
Stanford Professor Sean
Reardon shows that stu-
dents in the Windy City
have gained six years
of learning in just five
years.
Reardon based his
analysis on 300 million
elementary school test
scores covering more
than 11,000 school dis-
tricts.
“I don’t think CPS is
doing anything extraor-
dinary or special for
parent engagement, but
it may be worth pointing
out that we’re suddenly
leading the nation in stu-
dent growth and our kids
of color are outperform-
ing comparable kids of
color across the state,”
said Marilyn Rhames,
the founder of the non-
profit Teachers Who
Pray and a veteran teach-
er in Chicago.
Still, Rhames, author
of the upcoming book,
“The Master Teacher: 12
Spiritual Lessons that
can Transform Schools
and Revolutionize Pub-
lic Education,” cautioned
that there’s another side
to the success story that
shouldn’t be overlooked.
“There’s a huge race-
based disparity of per-
formance on the SAT,
which all 11th graders in
the state of Illinois has
to take,” Rhames said.
“Some CPS high schools
did the worst in the state.
So, how effective is our
growth, if it’s not trans-
lating into better prepa-
ration for college?”
But, it’s not just about
test scores, student at-
tendance is up, Chicago
high schools are offering
more rigorous courses
and high school grad-
uation and college en-
rollment rates continue
to rise, said Elaine Al-
lensworth of the Chicago
Consortium on School
Research.
The consortium has
provided a descriptive
examination of two- and
four-year college enroll-
ment patterns among
CPS graduates over the
last 10 years.
They found that CPS
graduates’
immediate
college enrollment rates
increased over the last
decade, with 63 percent
of 2015 graduates enroll-
ing in either a two- or
four-year college imme-
diately after high school,
compared to 50 percent
of graduates in 2006.
In 2015, CPS graduates’
rate of enrollment in
four-year colleges was
equal to the national
rate at 44 percent, and
higher than some urban
districts, including New
York and Los Angeles,
which were 38 percent
and 24 percent, respec-
See CHICAGO on page 9
