For the past 15 years, the leadership of MJP has been a strong, honest voice that has been working to change the conversation around incarceration and the justice system in the United States. We have consistently taken on emerging and important justice issues individually and now collectively. Our efforts have and continued to offer timely, relevant information and insight for advocates and policymakers to advance systems change.

 

Headquartered in Baltimore, we work to create and support a socially inclusive community believing in the idea that real communities are those in which every person can fully participate. Through all our efforts, we recognize that as we work for social inclusion, it also means that we are working to create social change.

 

In 2014, the City of Baltimore passed historic Ban The Box legislation for private employers and in doing so removed a hurdle to employment opportunities for the city’s returning population; a large demographic of Baltimore’s unemployed workforce.  We are proud that this legislation was crafted by us and the push for its passage and the campaign was a direct result of our efforts.

 

CURRENT CAMPAIGN:

 

The Maryland Justice Project in collaboration with our community partners will once again be in the forefront and will lead the expansion of the city-wide Ban The Box initiative by engaging in a city-wide outreach & education campaign. We are strategically positioned as the “point” organization on the initiative.

 

We are engaged in large scale outreach and education efforts that demonstrate how a criminal record affects employment opportunities in Baltimore City and how employment opportunities are critical to addressing one of the primariy barriers to reentry.

 

We will work with business organizations, business leaders, chambers of commerce, etc to educate them on the new law, their responsibilities, the benefits of the law and the positive impact their compliance will have on our city and on their own organizations.

 

We are currently involved in an extensive outreach effort to those job seekers whom this legislation directly impacts through a variety of points of entry including libraries, social service agencies, etc to educate them so that they may be educated and empowered to seek employment.