Transforming Justice and Safety Ecosystems Through Cross-Sector Collaborations

Abstract

The Aspen Institute Criminal Justice Reform Initiative’s Justice and Governance Partnership (JGP)[i] seeks to reimagine and transform the justice ecosystem in mid-size and micropolitan/rural[ii] regions – places where crime rates per capita are often higher than in larger cities in the United States but receive much less public attention and philanthropic support. Rather than focusing solely on the criminal justice system or on legislative policy change, JGP operates across multiple public sectors, such as housing, education, and health care, in a local ecosystem, connecting services with the public safety and justice system using hyperlocal data. JGP promotes the ways in which a collaborative ecosystem can support discretionary policies on the local level that improve residents’ experience of justice, for example, utilizing mental health crisis teams as an alternative to arrests. JGP provides an alternative to ‘crisis management governance’—the reactive, emergency response approaches that over-criminalize individuals and communities and overlook the root causes of crime and injustice, which disproportionately impact lower-income residents of color.

The initial lessons shared here explore JGP’s project goals, initial learnings, and measures of success in transforming justice: 1) new dispositions toward community-wide collaboration, racial equity, and pluralistic ways of knowing, 2) new practices related to neighborhood-level data and collective governance, and 3) new policies focused on discretionary policies and braided social purpose budgeting.

[i] While current lessons focus on the last 18 months of work in Grand Rapids, MI, plans exist to expand to Birmingham, AL, and three micropolitan/rural regions comprising “the Corridor” in South Carolina. 

[ii] A micropolitan city is defined as a city with 10,000 to 50,000 residents and its surrounding communities: https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/metro-micro.html.