RELEASE: Louisiana Progress to Advocate for Legislation to Decriminalize Poverty
Bills to reform traffic enforcement, lower fines and fees, and reign in government debt collection practices highlight Louisiana Progress’s agenda for the 2023 Louisiana legislative session.
BATON ROUGE, LA | April 11, 2023—”Louisiana is not a ‘poor state’, as you might often hear it labeled,” according to Peter Robins-Brown, executive director of Louisiana Progress, a nonprofit political advocacy organization based in Baton Rouge. “We’re actually a rich state with a horrifically high poverty rate. In Louisiana, it’s often expensive, and sometimes criminal, to be poor. By allowing that dynamic to continue we trap our people in cycles of poverty and criminalization. It’s a failed approach that also contributes to our state’s crime problem.”
In this year’s legislative session, Louisiana Progress is working with several legislators and advocacy partners to address various aspects of the system that perpetuate those cycles.
On the front-end, we’re looking at how people get swept up into the criminal justice system through aggressive traffic enforcement, with bills like HB 89, by Rep. Denise Marcelle, which would require law enforcement agencies to provide more transparency around traffic stop data, and HB322 (which is scheduled to be heard in the House Transportation Committee on Wednesday, April 12, at 10:00 a.m.), by Rep. Matthew Willard, which would move certain traffic violations to secondary offenses.
“One of the problems my constituents most often cite is the feeling that they’re being preyed upon by law enforcement when they’re on the road,” said Representative Denise Marcelle. “But we don’t have the data to support or refute their feelings. House Bill 89 would simply provide us with the transparency we need to understand how our traffic laws are being enforced.”
Once people are swept up into the system, they can get trapped there through excessive fines and fees that they can’t afford to pay. To address that, we’re trying to reduce some of those fines with bills like HB168, by Rep. Mandie Landry, and HB568, by Rep. Tammy Phelps.
Then, on the back-end of the system, we exacerbate the problem further through a combination of a government-run debt collection scheme, expensive and onerous criminal record expungement practices, and by making it hard for people with criminal records to find housing.
We’re working with partner organizations like the Justice & Accountability Center of Louisiana, the Louisiana Budget Project, the Louisiana Fair Housing Action Center, the Marijuana Policy Project, the Power Coalition for Equity & Justice, Step Up Louisiana, and Voice of the Experienced (VOTE) to deal with many of those problems through several bills, including:
SB111 by Sen. Royce Duplessis: Automate certain criminal record expungements and lower the fees for expunging those records
HB180 by Rep. Matthew Willard: Require more transparency about criminal background checks on rental applications
HB286 by Rep. Delisha Boyd: Make it easier to expunge records for convictions of simple marijuana possession
HB422 by Rep. Denise Marcelle: Reduce the Office of Debt Recovery’ (ODR) collection fee from 25% to 15% (scheduled to be heard in the House Ways & Means Committee on Thursday, April 13, at 9:00 a.m.)
HB477 by Rep. Vincent Pierre: Require agencies that refer debt to ODR to provide more data and transparency (scheduled to be heard in the House Ways & Means Committee on Thursday, April 13, at 9:00 a.m.)
“Ensuring that people with criminal records can secure good jobs and stable housing is critical to reducing recidivism in Louisiana,” said Representative Matthew Willard. “House Bill 180 will make it easier for people with records to obtain stable housing by embedding more transparency into the rental application process.”
Each of these measures on their own, and certainly all of them combined, can help make a measurable dent in Louisiana’s sky-high poverty rates. Hopefully, our state legislators will recognize that as well.
Who: Louisiana Progress, Justice & Accountability Center of Louisiana, Louisiana Budget Project, Louisiana Fair Housing Action Center, Marijuana Policy Project, Power Coalition for Equity & Justice, Step Up Louisiana, and Voice of the Experienced (VOTE)
What: Louisiana Progress agenda for the 2023 legislative session
When: April 11, 2023
Contact:
Peter Robins-Brown, Executive Director, Louisiana Progress, (504) 256-8196, peter@louisianaprogress.org