#178 On bail

Dear all,

At a workshop I went to in May, I got a clearer picture of the relationship between looking squarely at our earliest childhood defeats—which often involved settling for disconnection—and reclaiming our ability to act on our full power in the present. I’m excited about moving forward with a vision that more is possible.

And I had a lovely conversation with our five-year-old grandson the other day about what makes a family and how you can decide that people are part of your family. I give thanks for family that has extended beyond biology—through our neighborhood to other parts of the country and across the ocean.  There’s more potential for loss of course, but overall, what a blessing!

Love,
Pamela





On bail

As one small step in the long journey to end mass incarceration, several of us ventured through a metal detector and down a flight of stairs to the small basement room in our city where bail hearings take place. There we found the court players separated by a glass wall from a few benches for observers. Each of them works with a long computer list of names, with access to the nature of the charges. There are tall stacks of thick reports as well. People who have been arrested appear via a video screen from where they are being held at different police districts around the city.

Many of the individual hearings take less than a minute. The bail commissioner, or magistrate, verifies the person’s name, reads the charges, lets them know their court date and warns that if they don’t show up a warrant will be issued for their arrest. Then comes the question of bail. Sometimes this is done with minimal consultation. With a simple DUI or drug possession case, the person is often now released on their own recognizance—signing for bail without having to pay anything.  Sometimes the commissioner wants more information and enquires about previous arrests or detainers (requests that a person be held in relation to another charge). Sometimes it’s more complex. The DA’s representative suggests a bail amount, the Public Defender counters. The commissioner may ask for their reasoning. Then s/he decides, announces the amount of the bail, and the next person in line is brought in.

We learned from a fellow observer at the second session that the hearings are held every four hours, 24 hours a day, with different court personnel rotating in and out. With such a steep learning curve, all we could do at first was try to follow along. By the end of the afternoon, however, we had gotten our bearings and could start to reflect on the nature of what we were witnessing.

Everyone was focused on “just the facts”, as the conveyor belt on their assembly-line job brought an endless stream of human misery—oppression, straitened circumstances, addiction, poor judgment. The one sign of shared humanity we witnessed was with a veteran charged with DUI and damage of another vehicle. The commissioner probed to learn that he had served in Afghanistan, made a point of telling him about court programs for veterans, and thanked him for his service. 

It was hard to watch people attempting to dispense justice in the midst of such an unjust system. There was no uniform treatment here. The commissioner and DA’s rep in the second session were both much more punitive than those in the first. At one point, the latter recommended a bail of $300,000! That the commissioner came down to $50,000 was probably of scant comfort to the guy on the screen. The $5000 required up front was clearly beyond his reach or the reach of anybody else we saw that day. Even the challenge of finding $500 for bail of $5000 would keep most of these folks in jail or send them straight to the bail bondsmen and their extortionate rates.

Did any of the thirty or forty people we observed need to be behind bars before their arraignment? Maybe the guy who had missed 23 of his last 26 court appearances.  Possibly the two who had threatened family members. If so, then why not just say that those few are too much of a danger to society, rather than using a bail system that punishes the poor and lets the rich buy their way out? In the bigger picture, the people who are seriously endangering us and eroding the quality of life in our country have fat wallets, work in high places and would never be caught by this system.

I carry the weight of what we witnessed with me. How can those of us who have some protection from this part of our penal system (I hesitate to call it criminal justice) take in its enormity?  How can we face squarely the incredible injustice and pain that permeate it, and acknowledge how we have acquiesced to its existence? In a situation where silence implies consent, what needs to happen for us to speak out?






Scorning fear

The shirt in the pricey store window
was designed to jar the eye.

Did its creator feel a flutter of fear
in making that bold choice?
Was it sweet to scorn the fear
and forge ahead?

We need our courage.
If only it could be harnessed
to a higher good
than fashion.






Imagine: A new economy is possible!
Carbon neutral steel production

Producing one ton of steel generates 600 kg of other materials – including carbon, slag, dust, sludge, heat and gases. ArcelorMittal Tubarão, a Brazilian steel plant is now leading the industry in selling and reusing internally around 90% of what was previously categorized as waste. 

Both new production and recycling of used steel requires significant energy. The use of charcoal in steel production is common practice in Brazil. However, badly managed timber extraction can rapidly increase the rate of deforestation, with its many damaging environmental impacts. ArcelorMittal BioFlorestas has been cultivating renewable eucalyptus forests, rebuilding soils, and improving the overall health of the ecosystem, while using the charcoal to create ‘carbon neutral steel’; the carbon sequestration during the growth of the forest matches or even exceeds the carbon released during combustion for the steel production process.

https://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/case-studies/new-entry






Some things that have made me hopeful recently:


The European Union’s agreement on a total ban on bee-harming pesticides
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/27/eu-agrees-total-ban-on-bee-harming-pesticides

American Samoa’s success in finally getting their own full-service bank — and renewing energy for public banking in the United States.
https://www.americanbanker.com/news/american-samoa-finally-gets-a-public-bank-and-us-states-are-watching

New Zealand’s ban on all new offshore oil exploration as part of a 'carbon-neutral future'
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/12/new-zealand-bans-all-new-offshore-oil-exploration-as-part-of-carbon-neutral-future
and New Jersey’s ban on offshore drilling.
http://observer.com/2018/04/phil-murphy-signs-bill-banning-offshore-drilling-new-jersey/

An indigenous town in Mexico that banned outside politicians, so they could address their own issues in their own ways.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/03/mexico-indigenous-town-banned-politicians-cheran 






Resources

Money and Soul
A transcript of a keynote address I delivered at a Quaker conference in New Mexico, June 2017
https://westernfriend.org/media/money-and-soul-unabridged


Toward a Right Relationship with Finance 
Check out this new book that I co-authored on Debt, Interest, Growth and Security.

The growth economy is failing to provide equitable well-being for humanity and a life-sustaining future for Earth.  However our institutional endowments and individual retirement are dependent on that same growth economy.  This book:
    • offers background on our current economic system--how it is based on unearned income on the one hand and debt on the other, with a built-in momentum toward economy inequality and ecological overshoot;
    • frames the conversation within the context of our deepest values and beliefs;
    • suggests plausible and historically grounded alternatives to the current system, particularly with regard to financing retirement; and
    • invites everyone to imagine new forms of durable economic and social security, and to help create the relationships and institutions that will make them a reality.
With many people now counting as never before on the performance of Wall Street for retirement security, how can this system be challenged with integrity and effectiveness?  Can we break with our dependence on financial speculation and build up new structures of security in a transformed, life-centered economy?

To order the book, or read it on line, go to http://www.quakerinstitute.org/?page_id=5 and scroll down.



More resources

www.findingsteadyground.org

Resource from my friend Daniel Hunter, Building a Movement to End the New Jim Crow; An Organizing Guide.  http://www.danielhunter.org/books/building-movement-end-new-jim-crow-organizing-guide 

Posts on other web/blog sites:

In http://www.classism.org/gifts-american-dream/, Pamela Haines locates her family's homey DIY celebrations on a class spectrum of different connections to upward mobility.

            http://www.transitionus.org/blog/unlikely-suspects-–-deep-outreach-diverse-initiating-groups-–-pace-building-trust

        http://www.classism.org/demolition-derby

Muscle Building for Peace and Justice; a Non-Violent Workout Routine for the 21st Century--an integration of much of my experience and thinking over the years:  https://www.trainingforchange.org/publications/muscle-building-peace-and-justice-nonviolent-workout-routine-21st-century (or just google the title)

faitheconomyecology.wordpress.com, a website that I've contributed to often (check the archives)

www.ourchildrenourselves.com, a home for all the parenting writing I've done over the past 20 years.  NOTE THE NEW URL.