The Center for Justice Innovation is a community justice organization that centers safety and racial justice in partnership with communities, courts, and the people most impacted. We have worked for nearly 30 years to build safe, thriving communities by creating and operating innovative programs, conducting field-leading research, and sharing what we learn with justice systems and communities across the country.
Governments across the country are shoring up responses to crime, rather than minimizing the need for these responses in the first place. Highlighting recent research and encouraging examples of innovation, this policy brief makes the case that community safety is part of community justice, and that public safety investment needs to be expanded "upstream," beyond the boundaries of the criminal legal system.
This fact sheet provides a brief description of the history, approach, and documented results of the Midtown Community Justice Center, one of the country's first problem-solving courts. It also gives an overview of the Justice Center's programming in areas such as social services, community engagement, and diversion programs.
Housing justice is a through line in the Center for Justice Innovation’s efforts to build safety and racial justice. In our new video, you’ll meet tenants, Center staff, and partners from the community and government working to prevent evictions, respond to tenant needs, and support access to safe, stable, and affordable housing.
The Recovery and Reform team provides high-quality training and technical assistance to improve community and legal system responses to behavioral health and reduce harm to individuals and communities. This work is guided by our values: person-centered practices, equitable collaboration, transformative impact, and anti-racist and anti-oppressive framework. Learn more about this team's work and how they can assist jurisdictions and communities across the country.
Vincent Schiraldi used to run probation in New York City; now he’s questioning whether it should exist at all. Schiraldi says some of the roots of mass supervision—and its connection to mass incarceration—can be found in a surprising place: the Supreme Court’s 1963 Gideon decision. It recognized, but failed to adequately support, a poor person’s right to a lawyer. Hear the final episode in New Thinking’s “Gideon at 60” series.
In this report, the Center for Court Innovation’s West Coast Initiatives team shares valuable lessons derived from its experience in helping to plan and launch equitable early diversion programs in Los Angeles. The insights offered here can provide guidance for other diversion initiatives in efforts to bridge the gap between legal systems and communities while caring for vulnerable populations.
In his 22 years as presiding judge of the Red Hook Community Justice Center, Judge Alex Calabrese has always taken a people-centered approach in his courtroom, understanding the underlying issues that brought people to court and suggesting services and programs that would help address them. We are incredibly grateful for Judge Calabrese's service. He has made a deep and lasting impact on the residents of Red Hook and the justice system as a whole.
The idea of community justice encompasses a diverse and growing range of evidence-based initiatives which seek to reduce crime by strengthening communities and redressing longstanding inequities. In recognition of the ways in which the approach has evolved over the years, this publication presents a new set of guiding principles of community justice and offers inventive models for putting them into practice, both inside and outside of the courtroom.
The Red Hook Community Justice Center works to strengthen Red Hook, Brooklyn, and surrounding areas by reducing crime and the use of incarceration, improving public trust in justice, and collaborating with the community to solve local problems.
