The Innies

A slightly overcast and humid morning but little can dampen my good mood.   Today, the Center for Economic Opportunity (CEO) awarded the first "Innies" -- the New York City Innovative Nonprofit Awards -- with a breakfast ceremony at Gracie Mansion presided over by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Deputy Mayor Linda Gibbs.  The Center didn't win the big prize (that went to GreenCity Force) but we were among the ten non-profits honored for using data to fight poverty in innovative ways.   We were recognized in particular for the work we have done in Red Hook to help low-level defendants avoid incarceration and lead productive, law-abiding lives.  In my grip-and-grin opportunity with the Mayor, he fondly remembered touring the Justice Center with Amanda Burden and meeting Judge Calabrese before he became Mayor.

While it is always fun to receive a little recognition, the best part of the ceremony came at the end when one of the staffers from CEO came up to (re)introduce herself to me.  While I didn't recognize her, she was
part of the original Youth Justice Board class (2004 I believe).   After leaving the Board, she went to college, then became an Urban Fellow, before joining CEO to work on social innovation.  She credited the Youth Justice Board with sparking her interest in government and giving her the confidence that she could be an active participant in the process.  A living, breathing example that our work makes a difference on both the lives of individuals and in policy circles...hard to beat that for a pick-me-up on a grey Wednesday morning.

On Public Service

On Wednesday, I participated in the annual presentation of the Sloan Public Service Awards by the Fund for the City of New York.  I've written about the Sloan Awards a lot in the past (for example, in 2012, 2011, 2010, and 2009), so I will try to keep it brief here.  These awards honor some of the unsung heroes of New York City: the exemplary city employees who run our libraries, steer our traffic, clean up our schools, and care for our sick, among other tasks.

One of the awardees who struck a chord with me this year was Linda Pantages, a fiscal administrator at the Department of Youth and Community Development.  As became palpably clear during the selection process, Pantages has helped dozens of New York non-profits, many of them small and struggling, figure out how to meet the City's accountability standards and receive funding for their work with young people.

I don't know her personally, but I think it is fair to say that operating the Center for Court Innovation would be impossible without people like Pantages inside government.  Our operational model is built on partnership with city, state, and national government.  At each of these levels, we have been fortunate to work with dedicated individuals who understand what we are trying to do and can help us navigate the bureaucracy to get what we need.  Civil servants are all too often caricatured or used as props by demagogues who deride government as inefficient and even malevolent.   Events like the Sloan Awards offer a much-needed corrective to this narrative.   (In a phone call this week, a friend pointed out that the only silver lining to events like the terror attack at the Boston marathon is that they too underline that government can be effective.)

Two other highlights from a busy week:  last night I co-hosted a wonderful party in honor of the Wesleyan Center for Prison Education.  Just this week, a participant in the program was paroled and accepted for admission at the New School -- the fifth such student to be released and enrolled in college.

Finally, one of the best things I've read in awhile appeared online: Arkadi Gerney's story in the New Yorker about the work of Mayors Against Illegal Guns and his own relationship with guns and gun violence.  Not to be missed.

On Leadership

Leadership has been very much on my mind this week.

First, I attended Coro New York's annual civic leadership benefit.  Back in 1992, I spent a life-changing year as a Coro Fellow.  The experience fundamentally altered my career trajectory, introducing me to New York City, the field of criminal justice, and a number of people like John Feinblatt and Maddy Lee that would go on to have a huge influence on my life.  Just as important, Coro profoundly shaped the way that I think about the world.  In particular, it helped me to see that there are numerous ways to be an effective leader -- and that autocratic and charismatic leadership styles aren't always the best, particularly in the long run.

I think my Coro experience is one reason I have been drawn to the behind-the-scenes style of reform that Herb Sturz pioneered at the Vera Institute of Justice and that John Feinblatt embraced at the Center for Court Innovation.  Last night, I attended a small farewell gathering for one of Herb's successors, Michael Jacobson.   One of the things that I admire about both Herb and Michael and John -- and that I have tried to emulate -- is their commitment to research.

It turns out that this trait is crucial not just for non-profit management, but for the field of criminal justice in general.  We are putting the finishing touches on a national survey of criminal justice leaders, including police chiefs, elected prosecutors, corrections officials and state court chief judges and administrators.  In reviewing a draft of the study this week, one of the things that struck me is that there appears to be a strong relationship between research and innovation.  Leaders who invest in research also are more likely to rate themselves and their agencies as innovative.  

More to come on our national innovation survey in the weeks ahead...

Tales from the Green Monster

Last Friday, Newark came to Manhattan in the form of a staff meeting featuring Jethro Antoine and Judge Victoria Pratt of Newark Community Solutions.  Together, Jethro and Judge Pratt offered a ground-level view of life at the "Green Monster," as the municipal courthouse on Green Street in Newark is sometimes known.

If the conversation had a theme, I think it would have been "small things can make a big difference."  Like many of our projects, Newark Community Solutions is attempting to reengineer how the justice system responds to minor crime.  For us, this means reducing the number of defendants who go to jail or receive fines and increasing the use of alternative sanctions such as community restitution and social services.  And it means making great efforts to promote compliance so that defendants aren't set up to fail.

One of the ancillary benefits of our approach is that, if all goes well, it should reduce the number of individuals who receive warrants.   Warrants are more than a nuisance.  For many, they are essentially a walking jail term -- at any given moment, on any given day, they are susceptible to being picked up by police and dragged into jail, even if they are guilty of no misbehavior at present.  And, in many cases, the outstanding warrants are decades old or involve small, unpaid fines.  No matter how ancient or minor, the presence of outstanding warrants on a individual's record can have a massive impact on his or her behavior and life prospects.

In addition to reducing the use of fines, Newark Community Solutions also seeks to decrease the issuance of warrants through a focus on procedural justice.  Judge Pratt is one of the leading practitioners of procedural justice that I have ever had the privilege of observing.   She is particularly adept at using plain language in the courtroom to ensure defendant comprehension.

Judge Pratt gave a nice example of this on Friday, talking about how when she started on the bench she used to ask defendants about their use of "psychotropic medication" -- and received nothing but blank looks and demurrals in return.  When she instead started to ask defendants about whether they took anything to "clear their minds," the conversations became much richer and more productive.

It may seem like a small thing but, according to Judge Pratt, tweaking her language in the courtroom has helped to reduce the stacks of bench warrants on her desk.  And that can add up to big change indeed in the lives of hundreds of defendants each year.

Law Schools and Problem-Solving Justice

I spent last night at Brooklyn Law School, guest-lecturing at a class on problem-solving justice taught by Anne Swern of the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office.  This is a somewhat regular assignment for me -- I think I have taught the class four of the past five years.  

The class at Brooklyn Law is, at least in part, the product of a push we made a few years back at the Center for Court Innovation to try to introduce problem-solving justice into the legal curriculum.  Our thinking at the time was that if we wanted to institutionalize the concepts and practices associated with problem-solving courts, then it made sense to try to influence how the next generation of lawyers were being educated. 

I think you'd have to call our efforts to influence academia a mixed success at best.  In fairness, we didn't devote a lot of resources to the effort. We did some convening of interested law school professors, devised a model curriculum, piloted it at Fordham Law School, and then posted the curriculum on our website.   A handful of folks, like Anne Swern at Brooklyn Law, picked up the course and chose to adopt or adapt it. By and large, the people who did so were adjunct faculty -- mostly sitting judges teaching a law school class on the side.  We didn't really make any inroads with core law school faculty.  And the number of law schools who added a class on problem-solving justice was minimal.  

Awhile back, we attempted to do a review of problem-solving classes at American law schools.  The list is dated, but worth checking out for anyone who is interested.  I've since noticed a few newer classes emerging, like this one at New England Law.  Also worth checking out is this list of therapeutic jurisprudence courses compiled by the University of Arizona.  Therapeutic jurisprudence has developed alongside problem-solving courts and the two movements have much in common.  Therapeutic jurisprudence has been more successful in influencing academia thanks largely to the efforts of David Wexler and the late Bruce Winick, the two leading proponents of the idea.

In all honesty, I had mostly given up on law schools and moved on to other things, but last night may have rekindled my interest -- it was heartening to meet two dozen bright, well-informed young people who were keenly interested in thinking through the implications of drug court, mental health court and other problem-solving models.  I wonder whether the current challenges faced by many law schools, which are struggling to both maintain enrollment and place their graduates in jobs, will create some sort of opening for new curricular ideas.  We'll see.

How To Raise Money

Yesterday, I spent some time with a friend who runs a non-profit advocacy group.  He revealed that he is stepping down as executive director.  The reason?  He has grown weary of fundraising to support the organization.  This is not an uncommon refrain among non-profit administrators, sadly.

I have worked my entire professional life in the non-profit sector.  Like other non-profit executives, fundraising is a significant part of my job.  Awhile back, I tried to distill some of the lessons that I have learned about fundraising for staff here at the Center for Court Innovation.  (I tried to come up with ten lessons, but ran out of steam at nine.)  I have reproduced a version of that memo here in the interests of helping other non-profit directors avoid burn-out.  One caveat: fundraising is a highly idiosyncratic endeavor;  what works for one person may not work for another.

1. It Ain’t Magic
The screenwriter William Goldman’s famous declaration about Hollywood – “Nobody knows anything” – applies equally to fundraising.  Distrust anyone who tells you there’s a “secret” to successful fundraising.  The real secret is to do quality work.  Good ideas, clearly-thought-out strategies, and well-implemented programs tend to sell themselves.

2. Listen Before You Talk
It is important to know your audience before you open your mouth or put pen to paper.  You need to understand where the funder is coming from in order to craft the best possible message.  Are they Democrats or Republicans?  Do they have a national perspective or are they neighborhood-focused?  What language do they use to talk about their work?  Look at the funder’s website, annual report, and 990.  Look at the grants they have made in the past. You need to show funders how your program’s work connects to their mission.  Lots of funders have their own buzzwords (e.g. “civil society,” “global inclusion,” “place-based initiatives”).  It is always helpful to parrot back to the funder their own rhetoric.  It is also important to be flexible: shape your message to suit your audience.

3. Don’t Flatter Yourself
Many funders hear nothing but good news – day after day, they see a parade of programs extolling their own virtues.  As you might imagine, skepticism is an occupational hazard for most foundation executives.  As a result, it is best to avoid self-congratulation when dealing with them.  Try not to use flat, declarative statements like “Our program is a success.”  Far better to say something like, “Researchers have documented that our program has helped improve compliance rates with alternative sanctions.  This led the National Center for State Courts to give us an award for innovation.”  If possible, let the facts speak for themselves and allow your listener to draw the appropriate conclusion.

4. Admit Your Flaws (But Do It Selectively)
Reality is messy and doesn’t always conform to our desires or best-laid plans.  Some program participants fail.  Some partnerships are fraught with tension.  It is ok to admit to a few shortcomings – in fact it bolsters your credibility.  The trick is to highlight the right shortcomings.   Like a lawyer in court, you should never ask a question or raise a problem that you don’t know how to answer.  An example of a “good” shortcoming to highlight would be: “The hardest part of this project has been our relationship with Probation.  We made a number of mistakes in the early days because we hadn’t identified the right contact person and we hadn’t earned the agency’s trust.  But ever since we figured out a way to get probation officers the information they need quickly, the partnership has taken off...”  This sounds more credible than simply saying “Our relationship with Probation is great.”

5. Less Is More
Both of these statements are 100 percent accurate.   Guess which one is better from a fundraising perspective:

Statement #1: “Our program serves both criminal defendants and walk-ins from the community.”

Statement #2: “Our original vision for the program was to serve criminal defendants, but we couldn’t get judges to send us enough participants, so in an effort to boost our numbers, we decided to accept walk-ins from CFAR and SBLDC, and now we’re serving a mixture, although on any given day, the program might have all criminal defendants or all walk-ins, it just depends upon what day of the week it is, because on Mondays, there’s a judge that loves sending us participants, but on Tuesday, there’s a substitute judge, so we get fewer participants on that day...”

You get the idea.  Whenever possible, keep it simple.  Don’t get bogged down in the details.  Use numbers sparingly.  And by all means, avoid “inside baseball” – stay away from insider jargon, acronyms and abbreviations whenever possible.

6. Tell A Story
Almost every play, movie or novel has a basic three act structure: beginning, middle and end.  We tend to think in stories – it helps us make sense of the world.   Keep this in mind when dealing with funders.  Provide them with narrative arcs whenever possible.  In my experience, the best place to start any conversation or proposal is with a compelling need statement.  Describe the problem that you are trying to address as concretely as possible.  We are, after all, in the business of trying to solve problems.  And wherever possible, use real people to highlight how the program works: the defendant who got clean and sober, the victim who feels safer, the judge who now does things differently, the community resident who thinks her neighborhood is safer.

7. Sell Yourself
Fundraising is, in many respects, like dating.  Funders like to invest in people as much as they like to invest in ideas.  Look for ways to make a personal connection to the funder – perhaps they are a soccer fan like you are.  Or maybe you both live in the same neighborhood.  Or have kids the same age.  Maybe you know someone in common.  Any small connection helps.  Also, as in dating, neediness can be off-putting.  No matter how dire your funding situation, don’t convey desperation.

8. Failure Is Inevitable
There’s an old Nike commercial that I love.  In it, Michael Jordan says, “I missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot…and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life.  And that is why I succeed.”  The same wisdom applies to fundraising.  Rejection is part of the process.  You’ve got to risk failure in order to succeed.  For every ten proposals you send out, maybe one or two will come back with a positive response.  Try not to get discouraged.

9. Success Breeds Success
If you can find one funder to invest in you or your idea, you’ll find others.  The bad news is that funders tend to be risk-averse.  Very few like to be the first one to fund something, so finding the initial funder is usually the hardest.  The good news is that, like wolves, many funders travel in packs – if one of them funds you, all of them will.

Greatness

Thanks to the magic of DVR, I was able to watch two of the greatest athletes ever perform at the peak of their powers yesterday.

First, I saw Barcelona overturn a 2-nil deficit to defeat AC Milan in the Champions League by an aggregate score of 4-2.   At the heart of the victory stood Lionel Messi, who scored two great, game-changing goals.  If you have even the slightest interest in sport, you owe it to yourself to find a way to watch Messi play.  He's truly a once-in-a-lifetime kind of talent.  There is nothing obviously world-class about Messi when you look at him.  He's not big -- in fact, he's often the smallest guy on the pitch.  He doesn't appear strong -- although he is clearly tough given how many knocks he takes and how few games he misses.  He is fast, but not blindingly so.   But there is something magical about Messi's feet and his brain.  My friend David Shenk and others have written about how genius is largely a product of hard work rather than some god-given attribute.  I find that argument mostly compelling until I watch someone like Messi play.  And then I find it hard not to believe that he has been endowed with a special gift that no amount of practice could possibly summon.

After watching Barcelona's comeback victory, I then fast-forwarded my way through the Miami Heat's win over the Atlanta Hawks.  In some ways, this was an unexceptional, mid-season NBA game, except for the fact that it was the Heat's 19th win in a row.  They are playing the game at an unbelievably high level at the moment.  While the ESPN highlights tend to focus on the Heat's propensity for alley-oop dunks, what has impressed me the most during this win streak is how many open jump shots they get.  They penetrate and rotate the ball as well as any team I can remember.

At the heart of the Heat's success is, of course, Lebron James.  He actually had a bad shooting night against the Hawks -- an exceedingly rare occurrence these days.  But it is a measure of his greatness that he is still able to dominate a game without shooting well thanks to his passing, rebounding, energy, and defensive presence.   To watch him do all of these things night after night  -- much to my wife's chagrin, I have NBA League Pass -- has been a regular source of joy throughout the long winter.

At the risk of being corny, I find the greatness of Lebron James and Lionel Messi inspiring.  Whenever I talk to young people just starting their careers, I always advise them to worry less about what they will be working on and more about who they will be working for and with.  I encourage them to seek out great bosses and great colleagues.  That was what made the difference for me.  When I met John Feinblatt and started working with people like Michele Sviridoff and Eric Lee and Al Siegel (and so many others)...that was when my career kicked into another gear. Working with folks like these is a little bit like being a teammate of Messi or James -- they put you in a position where you can shine and you end up developing better work habits along the way.

Non-Profit Musings

I spent a good part of the last two days talking about non-profit innovation.  First, I spent some time with the 2013 class of Coro Fellows, who are just beginning month-long non-profit assignments.  Then I attended an upstate Nonprofit Leadership Summit.

At both locations, I tried to make the case that the non-profit sector is one of the under-appreciated strengths of the United States (self-serving, I know).  This idea came up last week when I met with a visiting prisoners' rights advocate from Turkey.  One of the things she talked about was how difficult the playing field was for a non-governmental organization in Turkey -- the country didn't have a rich tradition of civic groups working to achieve important social goals.

By contrast, American history is rife with voluntary organizations and charitable causes.  Indeed, de Tocqueville highlighted this feature of American life nearly two hundred years ago, writing in Democracy in America:

“Through associating, the coming together of people for mutual purpose, both public and private, Americans are able to overcome selfish desires, thus making both a self-conscious and active political 
society and a vibrant civil society functioning independently from the state.”

Despite the importance of non-profit organizations to our economy (I recently read that non-profits employ more than 13 million people in the US), non-profits tend not to attract a lot of public attention.  The other day I was bemoaning this fact and complaining that The New York Times has a daily business section, but no non-profit equivalent.  But then I realized that, if you look at it the right way, every section of The New York Times is the non-profit section.  Indeed, you can't read the arts section without reading about non-profit theater and dance companies, to say nothing of museums.  And you can't read the front page without coming across some non-profit group that is either implementing or influencing government policy.  Even the sports section is full of stories about colleges and organizations like the US Olympic Committee.   

Like anything else, if you look hard enough you can find faults with the non-profit sector.  Indeed, the former head of National Public Radio has recently released a book criticizing charities for, among other things, not achieving demonstrable impacts.  (Full disclosure: I haven't read the book, just the coverage of it.)  

I don't deny that there are problems in our sector -- redundancy, low-performing groups, mushy thinking, etc.  But I'd be awfully surprised if non-profits didn't come out ahead when you compared them to businesses and government agencies on these fronts.   

Rehabilitation and Prevention in the Bronx

This afternoon, Bronx Community Solutions hosted a lunch to celebrate moving into new space in the Bronx Criminal Court.  After 7 years of operating out of various windowless nooks and crannies, the project now has an attractive office to call its own.  At today's lunch event, Bronx District Attorney Rob Johnson spoke about his connection to the Bronx Community Solutions space, which formerly served as a courtroom; when he was a judge, Johnson actually presided over arraignments there.

Johnson's history with Bronx Community Solutions goes even deeper than that.  As our deputy director, Al Siegel, made clear in his remarks, Johnson helped plant the seed for Bronx Community Solutions.  Almost a decade ago, he argued that we should try to apply community court-style sanctions (i.e. community restitution and social services) to misdemeanor offenders throughout the Bronx, as opposed to a single neighborhood.  In his speech, Johnson picked up on this theme, emphasizing the importance of an approach to justice that foregrounds "rehabilitation and prevention" rather than simply defaulting to incarceration over and over again.

There was a lot to like about today's event, which featured delicious cupcakes, representation from almost all of our criminal justice partners in the Bronx, and plenty of good cheer.  But my favorite part was simply being in the space, which is bright and airy and adorned with quotations from a range of people whose lives have intersected with Bronx Community Solutions -- cops, defendants, attorneys, judges and others.  Even without the inspiring wall text, the non-verbal message that the space sends to participants is clear: Bronx Community Solutions is a program that is designed to treat individual defendants -- and the legal process -- with dignity and respect.

Brushes With The Law

Another good event from our friends at the Center for New York City Affairs at the New School this morning: Brushes with the Law: Young New Yorkers, Neighborhoods and the Criminal Justice System.  The Center for New York City Affairs has consistently been a force for good in local public policy, helping to lay the groundwork for significant juvenile justice and child welfare reform in New York City.  The event was timed to coincide with the release of a new edition of the Child Welfare Watch, which, as it happens, touches on a number Center for Court Innovation projects, including our work in Red Hook and Brownsville and our efforts to assist with NY Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman's adolescent diversion program.  (Indeed, the artwork that the Center for New York City Affairs used to promote this morning's panel -- featured above -- is a mural at the Red Hook Community Justice Center.)

In some respects, it was tempting to view today's event at the New School as the culmination of years of work by the Center for New York City Affairs and by the dozens of advocacy groups, non-profit service providers, government agencies, and foundations that were represented in the audience.  Despite NYC Administration for Children's Services commissioner Ron Richter's contention that the overhaul of the system will never be complete because new needs will always be emerging, today's panel was a healthy reminder of just how far we have come in New York City.  Almost every indicator that came up -- from the number of young people in detention to the number of cases adjusted out of the system to the number of new programs being put in place to serve troubled teens -- is pointing in the right direction at the moment. I'm proud that the Center for Court Innovation has played a small, supporting role in all of this.