The Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition (CCJRC), a progressive advocacy group, is one of the seven organizations nationally to receive the True Reform institutional grant from the Public Welfare Foundation.
“Public Welfare Foundation’s 75th anniversary provides an opportunity to reflect and look forward in anticipation,” said Public Welfare Foundation President Candice C. Jones in a news release in early June. “Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition has been a long-standing partner of Public Welfare Foundation. They are paving the way for a new, transformative approach to justice in Colorado that is community-led, restorative, and racially just. They deserve not just our praise, but our investment to ensure that they can continue to advance this work in the years to come.”
The True Reformer institutional grant is given to organizations that advocate for racially just, restorative, and community-led approaches to justice, according to the foundation These one-time grants allow these organizations to invest in their infrastructure by strengthening, organizing, and improving their operations.
CCJRC will use the grant to plan and start a comprehensive communications plan, supply learning opportunities and professional development for their employees, and develop systems to provide information and training to their partners in Colorado.
“Colorado Criminal Justice Reform Coalition is honored to receive a True Reformer grant that will allow us to make critical investments to strengthen community capacity to understand and influence public budgeting for community safety and challenge false narratives that racialize crime and fuel support for mass incarceration in political and popular discourse,” said CCJRC Executive Director Christie Donner in a news release.
The Colorado Criminal Justice Reform’s mission is to help reduce the overuse if the criminal legal system by advancing community-based health and safety. The CCJRC was made in 1999 by a group of people who wanted to end the mass incarceration issue in Colorado. The organization has now grown to over 7,000 members, and has successfully helped close seven prisons in Colorado, re-enfranchise people on parole, increase available funding for community-based behavioral health treatment, and reduce the number of collateral consequences for a criminal record.
The six other organizations that were given the True Reform grant are Operation Restoration in New Orleans; Michigan Center for Youth Justice; People’s Advocacy Institute in Jackson Miss.; The African American Roundtable in Milwaukee, Wisc.; Voices for a Second Chance in Washington, D.C.; and Women on The Rise in Atlanta, GA.
