Peoples’ lives are changing and our communities are safer through a restorative approach to justice in Orange County.
Could we help protect these programs?
We all want to feel safe, whether we’re in our homes with our families, in our communities, or on our streets. Safety is the foundation to keep our families thriving and our communities at peace.
This November, voters in California have a choice to make about the best ways to keep our communities safe.
A decade ago, we, the voters in California, passed a law to redirect funding from prisons to instead invest in more effective safety measures like drug and mental health treatment and funding for homelessness prevention and housing. (Proposition 47)
In Orange County, programs like Project Kinship and Conexiones were started in collaboration with the Board of Supervisors and School Districts across Orange County to help lives impacted by incarceration, gangs and violence, at-risk youth, and young adults.
The holistic support provided includes counseling, a process of healing, mental health, legal consultation, family support, wellness, housing, and job training. Project Kinship works with the school districts of Santa Ana, Garden Grove, Brea, Cerritos, Newport Beach, and Costa Mesa.
Learn more about how lives in Orange County were transformed by programs like Project Kinship by viewing the Project Kinship video story on its website.
Studies have shown that these programs change peoples’ lives, prevent drug addiction and falling into cycles of crime and ensure everyone in our communities stay safe.
Billy Taing and his family fled violence in Cambodia when he was three years old, coming to the United States as refugees. Then, like so many immigrant youths, he joined a gang where he thought he found belonging and acceptance. A terrible decision led to a life sentence in prison, an order for deportation, and separation from his family until the age of 43.
As his life purpose came into focus, his spiritual training deepened, and his desire to serve grew – Billy successfully petitioned and received a full and unconditional pardon, a set aside of the deportation order, and an acceptance into a union-wage electrician apprenticeship program. He now works as the co-director of the nonprofit organization API RISE, supporting currently and formerly incarcerated Asian Pacific Islander American community members.
Stories like Billy’s are like many others in our communities.
Despite the success of these restorative justice programs, this year we are being asked to vote on Proposition 36. Prop. 36 will re-classify petty crimes like shoplifting and drug possession as felonies, and increase prison time for people convicted of such crimes.
Because more money would be used towards keeping people in prisons, Prop. 36 would take away $100 million a year from rehabilitation and crime prevention programs, including more than $15 million from programs in Orange County.
Prop. 36 isn’t the answer. We must reject “tough on crime” culture war and failed policies of the past that keep prison beds full, our communities in fear, and none of us any safer.
Instead, our communities need real, proven solutions like investing in good schools, affordable housing, and treatment for mental health and drug addiction.
We can prevent crime before it happens by ensuring our local government invests not in sending more people to prison, but in getting guns off our streets, ensuring good jobs for all, and youth programs that open doors of opportunity for our next generation.
Vote No on Proposition 36.
Don’t return California to its worst days of ineffective and expensive mass incarceration and a time when we had fewer tools to keep our communities safe.
Another reason we should be showing up to vote is to secure homes for everyone in California:
What does Proposition 36 do?
Prop. 36 cuts safety programs and increases prison spending. Prop. 36 bills itself as a solution to retail theft and fentanyl but it’s not. Californians want a balanced approach to public safety, not a one-size-fits-all imprisonment.
Key Supporters
- CA District Attorneys Association
- CA Police Chiefs Association
- Walmart
- California Business Roundtable
Key Opponents
- Californians for Safety and Justice
- American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
- CA Teachers Association
- Asian Americans Advancing Justice Southern California
