Criminal Justice Council Public Hearing Set For 6:30PM Tonight In Wilmington

Come out to the CJC public hearing tonight at the Cornerstone Fellowship Baptist Church in Wilmington! Social Justice issues are all of our responsibility. This is where your voice will be heard.

My friend Syl Woolford regularly attends Criminal Justice Council meetings. He noted recently that the Council has removed public comment from the agenda so I immediately contacted CJC Chairman Matt Denn to ask why. Here's his answer ~

Subject: RE: CJC public comment removed?

Nancy -- thanks for your e-mail.  As you may know, the CJC did not have a public comment portion of its agenda before I became chair.  It is something that I added.  We stopped having it on the agenda about six months ago, the reason was that the majority of people who were making public comments were addressing specific, personal grievances that they had with either law enforcement or the correctional system, rather than the types of issues that CJC addresses as a group. 

We continue to accept public comments in writing, which are distributed to all Council members.  In addition, if any person or group has an issue that they wish to raise with the Council, they are welcome to contact me or the Executive Director Drew Fennell and we can consider putting them on the Council's agenda.  I have found Syl's input very helpful in the past, and if there is something he would like to present to the CJC I am happy to to put him on the agenda.

The CJC continues to hold public hearings in all three counties and in the City of Wilmington once a year, and I have made a particular effort to move those meetings out of government buildings and into the affected communities.  Our next public hearing is on October 3rd at 6:30 p.m. at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Wilmington.  These are open-ended hearings where people can address whatever issues they wish to the Councilmembers in attendance.  Turnout for these hearings has been up and down in past years, so whatever help you can provide in letting people know about these meetings would be very helpful.

 Syl replied ~ 

Matt

    Thank you for responding to Nancy's e-mail so promptly.

    Nancy is a warrior to the un-empowered people of the State of Delaware and her

comments always require those in power to acknowledge.

    As I mentioned to Nancy, I had spoken to Jay Lynch, Health and Human

Services, and Brendan O'Neill, Public Defender. after the meeting on Sept 16, 2013 and

ask them, "What happened in there!"

    Jay always accused me of being sacrcatic, I am really trying to be truthful.

    What I meant by the question is since the last CJC meeting:

                George Zimmerman was set free after killing Trayvon Martin.

                Attorney General Eric Holder said, "There are too many young men in

                        jail, especially those of color, and we should correct this problem."

                The CJC announced that, "the recitivism rate in Delaware is 75% after

                        three years, which translates into we now have a :"Criminal Class"

                       of people in our society!"

    If I were Chariman of the CJC or the Executive Director of the CJC, I would

say. "This will not continue under my watch!"

    But "NOBODY SAID ANYTHING!"

    During my brief conversation with Jay Lynch and Brendan O'Neill, Brendan

said, "What do you want us to do?'

     Believe it or not, I fixed the crime problem about two years ago with a grant

of $3,500.

     The solution is technology!

      CJC has invested $250,000 to predict crime. The same technology which predicts

crime can prevent crime.

       It has been proven that:

                Increasing child cares services in a community reduces crime

                Improving bus services in a community reduces crime.

                Improving tutoring services in a community reduces crime.

                Improving mental health services reduces crime.

                Providing family counseling services reduces crime.

                Providing K-12 tutoring services reduces crime

                Providing jobs, jobs, jobs reduces crime.

   Many of these services are already provide by Cathy McKay and

Connections CSP. The problem is developing a highly sophisticated

delivery system that can target those in need of the services and

deliver them in an efficient manner. (and also measure the results)

    Attached is a Powerpoint presentation which I don't think I have every

shown any of you. That is my fault, but it lays out how the system would

operate.

       

Syl

With this follow up reply from Matt Denn ~

Syl – thanks for your e-mail, I will try to look at your Power Point presentation.  Just a couple of follow-ups in response to your questions: 

1.        The recidivism numbers that were discussed at the CJC meeting were not new, they were part of a report that was released over the summer and was the subject of an article in the News Journal.  That does not mean that the numbers are good news – obviously, they are bad news – but they were not a surprise to most of the CJC members.

2.       I would respectfully disagree that no one said anything about the numbers.  I don’t know if you were able to stay for the entire meeting, but I asked the Council to make recidivism the focus of our planning for the coming year, which includes the prioritization of the Council’s discretionary federal grant money.   Given what the CJC does, asking it to focus its time and financial resources on a problem is asking it to do pretty much everything it can do.  We will see if the other Council members ultimately agree with me – I am one of over 20 members, and I don’t get to vote absent a tie – but I think I made my views pretty clear.

3.       If you have a program that you think should be supported, I would encourage you to work one of the non-profit organizations currently receiving CJC funds and submit a proposal to have the program funded when federal Byrne Grants become available.  Drew can provide you with a list of organizations that have experience with CJC grants, and with the grant deadlines (which I do not think have been set yet).

Thanks for your continued interest in this issue, it is one where I would very much like to see real progress. 

Read more at the CJC website: http://cjc.delaware.gov/ 
Cornerstone Fellowship Baptist website: http://www.cornerstonefbc.org/
20 West Lea Boulevard
Wilmington, DE 19802
(302) 762-9601
Info@Cornerstonefbc.org

~*~