We at the Collaborative Center for Justice are excited to update our Voices for Justice Network members on what we have been up to. Below you will find some highlights from earlier in the year before the pandemic, a description of some of the issues we have focused on in the COVID-era, and finally, some advocacy areas that you can plug into right now. The past year has been both challenging, and rich with opportunities to advance the cause of justice. We look forward to working together with you and our other community partners to create a more just society!
Advocacy
At the federal level, much of our advocacy efforts have centered on protecting environmental regulations, the rights and refugees and other migrants, and expanding social services and economic relief to families. In Connecticut, we worked with others to back a CT Green New Deal for the state, to oppose the expansion of the state’s fossil fuel infrastructure. Thank you to the 200 legislative prayer partners we had this year! The program remains a vital part of our mission and outreach to lawmakers. Be on the lookout for 2021 signups!
Educational Outreach
This year, we worked hard to connect with laypeople across the state by offering educational programs, usually connecting faith and public life. Some highlights include: a workshop for student advocates at the Yale Center for Climate Change & Health titled, “Community Values & Collective Action;” an advocacy basics training with Jubilee House ESL students; and a two-part conversation on Laudato Si with the Committee for Social Justice at St. Patrick-St. Anthony Parish, Hartford.
Community Organizing
After years of work, the Collaborative Center became the only Catholic founding member of the Greater Hartford Interfaith Action Alliance (GHIAA) in October 2019. GHIAA consists of 35 congregations and other faith-based institutions from all across Greater Hartford. We have come together across differences of race, class, the city-suburb divide, and religious traditions to pursue the common good.
GHIAA has five campaign areas, some currently on hold due to public health restrictions: gun violence, housing, public health, education, and criminal justice reform. Collaborative Center staff help lead the criminal justice reform team’s “clean slate” statewide legislative campaign. Currently, a criminal record, no matter how old, is a barrier to full citizenship for formerly incarcerated people and their families. Nationally, most employers (90%), landlords (80%), and colleges (60%) use background checks in the recruiting process. The clean slate bill would automatically expunge most misdemeanors and low-level felonies from qualified candidates, an improvement from the current, slow and often arbitrary petition-based system. The bill is still alive but on hold in the General Assembly due to its closure.
Educational Outreach Online
In the three months following the shutdown, we participated in the filming of a virtual Stations of the Cross screened on Facebook. The stations were sites in Hartford that were tied to our GHIAA community organizing campaigns. We also partnered with the Bernardin Center at Catholic Theological Union and Commonweal Magazine to facilitate a discussion on Catholic Social Teaching and prison reform. We also collaborated with the Center for Peace, Equity, & Justice at Friends Seminary to offer a conversation on faith-based advocacy.
Coming up: Collaborative Center for Justice Public Theology Conversations kickoff. October 22 at 4:30, “The Latinx Catholic Church & the US-Mexico Border” with Milton Javier Bravo of Commonweal Magazine. On October 27 at 4:30 “Black Lives Matter & the Catholic Church” with author & National Catholic Reporter opinions editor, Olga Marina Segura. Click here for more information and to register.
COVID-era Actions & Issues
Economic Relief for Poor & Working-class People
We have spent considerable energy advocating for relief for renters and homeowners, as well as Connecticut’s immigrant families who have been excluded from CARES Act aid. In May, we participated in car caravan demonstrations to generate added pressure on state lawmakers and Governor Lamont to cancel rent, and to create a relief fund that Connecticut’s 120,000 undocumented residents could tap into. In early June Governor Lamont struck a deal with immigration advocates and philanthropists to create a $3.5 million fund. Much more is still needed.
Other areas of ongoing concern we took up included: Sanctions and debt relief for all countries for the duration of the crisis; protecting humanitarian aid to El Salvador, Guatemala, & Honduras; and for provisions to make federal coronavirus relief packages more inclusive.
Care for Creation
Throughout the year we have engaged policymakers, fellow advocates, and everyday citizens in our opposition to the proposed fracked-gas power plant in Killingly, CT. The project threatens to undermine the state’s climate goals, and is misaligned with legislation passed in 2019 creating a permanent ban on fracking waste in CT. Additionally, it would place undue environmental and health burdens on a community that already has a power plant. While permitting continues to proceed, it is still an active area of advocacy.
Human Rights of Incarcerated People
Once it became clear that residents of congregate living facilities were at high risk for contracting the virus, we turned our attention to those with few advocates and no political power: incarcerated people. We collaborated with other advocates and organizers to urge Governor Lamont to reduce the state’s incarceration rate by releasing most youth, people held on bail, those near the end of their sentences, and those incarcerated not for crimes but technical parole violations.
By March 26, we spoke at our first virtual press conference with Sen. Gary Winfield to call attention to the issue. Later, we conducted education sessions for GHIAA clergy leaders, drafted clergy petitions to the governor for that body, and composed advocacy materials for the thousands of GHIAA congregants and Voices for Justice Network members.
Police Accountability
In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, we joined our voices with those calling for police reform. On June 12, with over 100 other religious leaders, we marched from Union Baptist Church to Hartford City Hall carrying the sacred books of our respective traditions. This action, one of about a dozen protests we attended, was a call for racial justice and a rebuke of the president’s use of the Bible for a photo prop. Additionally, the Courant published our third op-ed, this time on the need to redistribute resources from police departments to civilian agencies that directly address human needs.
Upcoming Advocacy Opportunities
- Congress must pass another COVID-19 relief package without further delay. Millions remain unemployed or underemployed. Food banks continue to see long lines of hungry families in need. Since Foodshare’s drive-up food distribution began at Rentschler Field, they’ve provided food to over 100,000 households. When the eviction moratorium ends, renters will still be responsible for paying back rent, which will be impossible for many households. People are suffering. Our leaders have a moral responsibility to take meaningful action to address peoples’ basic needs, particularly of the most vulnerable.
Contact your Members of Congress and urge them to work with Congressional leadership to pass legislation that would: provide meaningful rental assistance, increase SNAP benefits, ensure access to health care, guarantee adequate PPE for frontline workers, and provide an additional round of financial assistance, regardless of immigration status.
You can reference a helpful resource from the Coalition on Human Needs under their “Resources” tab.Read this informative piece from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities to learn more about the existing needs and what Congress needs to do. - Here in CT, immigrant rights advocates have been hard at work for months to get Governor Lamont to commit to financial assistance for the immigrant community in the state, particularly for those who are undocumented. Undocumented immigrants are not eligible for state and federal aid, and many other immigrants have been excluded from this aid too. Connecticut is home to approximately 120,000 undocumented immigrants. Many of them are frontline workers, who we know have been uniquely impacted by the pandemic. Many have lost their income because they are out of work because of COVID-19. Others have had to continue to report to work, even if conditions are unsafe, in order to support their families.
Contact Governor Lamont to urge him to address the needs of the immigrant community by adequately funding a financial relief fund for those who have been impacted by the pandemic. Advocates are calling for the creation of a $150 million aid fund. CT Students for a Dream has created an easy tool to send an email to Governor Lamont and your local legislators.
- Recently, there have been reports of a whistleblower complaint that ICE personnel have been conducting mass hysterectomies on immigrant women in their custody. These reports are unsettling and upsetting. There is a long, violent history of forced sterilizations of women of color in the United States. And this is not the first time ICE has been in the news about their treatment of people in their custody. They have been the subject of many other reports over the years about the inhumane treatment and abuse of immigrants in their custody. ICE’s disregard for the rights and life of immigrants needs to stop.Call or email your Members of Congress and urge them to ensure that a full investigation is completed and that ICE is held accountable for any mistreatment or human rights abuses.The organization Sister Song has organized a sign-on letter for an opportunity to join in solidarity with survivors and join a movement against this violence.The Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES) website has other informational resources and ways to take action.
- Nationally, energy is growing around the THRIVE Agenda. The THRIVE (Transform, Heal, and Renew by Investing in a Vibrant Economy) Agenda is a platform that recognizes that our country needs to address the interconnected issues of economic, racial, and environmental justice by putting people back to work in ways that will build a more just, sustainable economy. It consists of 8 pillars: creating millions of good jobs; investing in Black, Brown, and Indigenous communities; environmental justice; a just transition for workers and communities; workers’ rights; strengthening Tribal sovereignty and enforcing Indian treaty rights; averting the worst effects of the climate crisis; and reinvestment in public institutions that promote community wellbeing.
Calls are needed to your US Representative to urge them to support this agenda. You can find your Representative here. In the coming months we will share updates about similar efforts taking place here in CT. We believe that 2021 must be a year of bold, concrete action on climate and racial justice, and we’ll need your voice in these campaigns. - As the pandemic continues to rage across the country, frontline workers remain in need of adequate supplies of personal protective equipment (PPE). One group that often gets overlooked in this conversation is farmworkers. Farmworkers have continued to pick fruits and vegetables for our families to eat, while working and living in conditions that make them more vulnerable to COVID-19. Even before the pandemic, many farmworkers did not have health insurance or substantial protections at work. Approximately 60-75% of the 400,000 agricultural workers in California are undocumented immigrants, leaving them with even fewer protections. Read this Politico report for more information.
Calls and emails are needed to your Members of Congress to urge them to include protections for farmworkers in the next COVID-19 relief package. Remind them that not only is the health and safety of the farmworkers at stake, but the health of people around the country will be impacted if those who pick our fruits and vegetables are not adequately protected against COVID-19.The Coalition of Immokalee Workers has petition to Florida Governor DeSantis urging him to support workers’ rights. The Farm Labor Organizing Committee of the AFL-CIO asks for signatories on their petition asking big growers to provide adequate PPE to employees.
Find Your State & Federal Legislators
You can find your state legislators here: https://www.cga.ct.gov/asp/menu/cgafindleg.asp
You can find your US Senators here: https://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
You can find your US Representative here: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative
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Thank you for your advocacy!
