Voting Rights and the Criminal Legal System

From the library’s website. “This panel discussion will bring together representatives of several organizations that address the treatment and voting rights of currently and formerly incarcerated citizens.”

Panelist are: Kathi Harris, ProActive Project Grand Rapids,Percy Glover, Voting Access for All Coalition (VAAC), Gerald Tkach, League of Women Voters (LWV-Flint),Daniel Jones (Michigan Collaborative to End Mass Incarceration (MI-CEMI),Amani Sawari (SawariMedia, Spread the Vote)

Librarian Jennifer Dye is hosting the panel. Detroit President of the League of Women’s voters, Rhonda Craig, joins the panel. She says one of the league’s goals is to have elected officials represent our entire community, not just a few.

She reads the League’s mission statement. She says you can join the league. Here is their website.
https://lwvdetroit.org/

There are about 50 people in the zoom room. Charles Thomas brings up the original US voting law that said that only white male property owners could vote.

Thomas, who is introducing the panel, then moves through the history of American voting. Jim Crow is next and put in place, as he says, in the states to maintain the power and keep the workforce. Women’s getting the right to vote, then first world citizens were allowed…

to vote. He says that incarceration is used, like Jim Crow, to disenfranchise people of color. Daniel Jones, who was incarcerated as a teenager is now the chairperson for the Voting Access for All Coalition, the VAAC. They are one of the host of the panel.

He says as a formerly incarcerated person he knows what it feels like to be silenced. He also ask everyone to attend their open door meetings. You can see Jones picture on the front page of VAAC’s website. He’s the tall person standing in the center. https://votingaccessforall.org/

Jones wants to end prison gerrymandering. He wants to insure voting rights to people in prison. As well as people on parole and ex-cons.

Kathi Harris of ProActive Project in Grand Rapids says that they have voter suppression problems in Grand Rapids. Here is her picture on their website.
https://proactivegr.us/

Percy Glover who is a member of VAAC, tells Harris his heart goes out to the Grand Rapids community and he is praying daily for them. This is probably in reference to the Patrick Lyoya shooting. https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/09/us/patrick-lyoya-police-shooting-charges/index.html

Glover is also a ex-convict. He says desperation sends people to jail. “People do things to try to find ways to change themselves and sometimes it’s not always responsible.”

He says when he got out of jail groups like VAAC and ProActive project did not exist and he did not have many resources to use when he got out. He says the issues with juvenile offenders “turns his stomach” and that racism still exist in “our” criminal justice system.

He hates the term “mass incarceration” because it only applies to one group of people, African American men in the United States. He said no other group has been arrested more in the US. He praises the Genesis County for making it’s self a resource and education center

so that people who come in won’t go back. He says that jail and prison are different. No books and tv in jail, where in prison you have libraries, education work programs. In jail you just “sit on your hands.” Maybe in jail you have a bible and a radio.

He says people in jail won’t trust a system like that. And Glover says it’s worse since some of the incarcerated have been wrongfully detained, arrested and convicted.

Here is a image of the panel. https://t.co/4XGKQgnX3F

Gerald Tkach of the Flint League of Women’s Voters has traveled to jails to try to register voters who are incarcerated. He says that each municipality are different when it comes to their cooperation in this process.

A rebroadcast of this meeting can be seen at the DPL’s youtube channel, https://www.youtube.com/user/detroitpubliclibrary
or back to the http://lwvdetroit.org site.

Amani Sawari of Spread the Vote is their chapter leader and she oversees their justice services department, which includes vote by mail in jail programs. She wants to expand this program across the state of Michigan.

Here is the link to Spread the Vote.
https://www.spreadthevote.org/

She brings up the irony that jail’s are right across from the county clerks offices and that makes no sense. She feels they need to connect to work on this problem.

Harris says that engagement and education is needed to get ex convicts registered.
https://www.spreadthevote.org/

She says she is not afraid to go to places that others would not. She feels that some groups of people just plain feel they are better than others.

The panel is asked what type of work are their groups engaged in the voting and legislative space. Tkach tells a story of some jails that will not give absentee ballots to convicts. He says that seems like common sense to him.

He says 43 states have no interest of people in prison. 70 percent of people in jail are black, and that in Genesee county only 40 percent of the people in the city are black. He says that a system should be set in place so you can vote in prison.

The voting and legislation question is brought up again. Sawari says Spread the Vote they do voter registration and help folks get ID’s as part of their vote by mail and jail. They provide stamps, envelopes and forms needed to vote. They create voter guides.

Sawari ask the panel to go to the Spread the Vote website for more info on what they do.
https://www.spreadthevote.org/

Jones, who was given a life sentence as a juvenile and released when legislation was created that stopped juveniles’ from getting life sentences. He has efforts in place to stop to life without parole sentencing. His work also includes stopping…

juvenile’s from being sentenced to life in prison.

Glover laments the fact that so few vote. What is the motivation to get people registered and that they have to understand what those motivations are in getting people to vote. He says people fear their vote does not count. He also says there is not enough…

familiarity and information about candidates who are running for office. His group held a meet the candidates forum. He said 27 people campaigning for seats came to the jail to answer questions about their platforms. They have sponsored several of these forums....

that included mayoral elections candidates going to the jails to answer question.

Tkach, a former teacher, stands up for better treatment across the board for teachers, who are needed to teach convicts.

Thomas says this system of incarceration and racism were established for many reasons. When slavery ended mass incarceration began with African American men mostly being arrested for things like being homeless. He also talks about the criminal leasing system....

where states lease out humans. He says since they were no longer property prisoners could end up working on the same plantations that black slaves worked on during slavery. He says that prison gerrymandering is used to maintain money and power, and more congressional seats.

A question from the public wonders how voting in Wayne County jails are going. Jones says he served 23 years in prison so he was missed in two census counts. He says that not counting those people, or prison gerrymandering, leads to Wayne county not getting needed…

resources. Glover says that 60 percent of arrest are of black men who only make up 8 percent of the population in Genesee county and he says that this supporting that gerrymandering.

He is also concerned about the children of convicts and the generational incarceration and generational poverty that exist in the Black community. He says you can see how 70 percent of the adult prison population being black has hurt the black community.

He says the kids looking at the incarcerated adults and not having them there for kids is a generational problem. Dye brings up the 7:30 PM stop time for the panel, but allows a couple of questions. The question is asked that if there is a program that helps....

people get id’s in jail. Some say they have not see that program but Sawari says you may see it but it’s not across the board and that the only across the board program you see is the GED program in jails.

She says that not enough signatures were gathered to get some of those programs on the ballot for the upcoming election.

Glover agrees that you may see some great stuff in some prisons but there is not enough happening across the board and that it’s only happening in a few facilities.

Dye thanks all the panelist and says the Detroit Public Library’s youtube channel will have a copy of this zoom forum up on its site in the next couple of days.

Cheryl Bukoff says the league will be doing a candidate forum but wants to know if a forum that teaches people on learning about judges and their role. Jones says it would be helpful and he would like to ask a judge if they would give a life sentence to a person under.....

18? He said if the judge said yes he would not vote for that judge.

Glover says that he would ask about people of color being unfairly arrested. He wants to talk to them about creating a system that does not target African Americans. He wants to know how judges would make themselves accountable and responsible for all people…

and that they are creating a fair system. Dye closes the meeting by saying that she was glad this conversation took place. Meeting ends at 7:40 PM.

If you feel that any of the information in these tweets is incorrect or have any questions, please contact documenters@citybureau.org with your questions and concerns.

Forum ends at 7:40 p.m. This concludes the Detroit Public Library’s Voting Rights and the Criminal Legal System forum. For more meeting coverage, check out http://documenters.org.