Advocacy for CRESC means finding a very careful balance

I recently was invited to testify before the PA House of Representatives Committee on Government Operations, which held a hearing Wednesday 7/17 on various proposed changes to the PA Right to Know law which permits citizens access to most government records.  The proposed change would have barred anyone with a PA felony conviction from ever getting certain information under this law, and I offered the following, first pointing out that I was a private citizen and not a spokesperson for CRESC:

Testimony of James L. Cavenaugh on HB 480  Session of 2013 Amending the Right-to-know  Law   July 16, 2013

I am asking that  the House State Government committee, as it considers HB 480, consider who is a  felon and how the Commonwealth wants to treat these people. As an active member  of the Capital Region Exoffenders Support Coalition (CRESC, details at http://www.reentrynow.org/index.html ) I have gotten to know many people who  have felony convictions and yet have changed a great deal.   They have become businesspeople, taxpayers, and leaders. In short, they  are people who strengthen and improve our society. For  example:
      
John  W. Jackson has been home seven years.   In that time he has found a good job, is active in his church and has  founded a faith-based non-profit which raises money for scholarships so children  in the Harrisburg schools may go on to higher
education.
Vladimir Beaufils has been President of our Capital Region Exoffenders Support Coalition  for several years.  He is the  founder and Executive Director of Sound Community Solutions (details at  http://www.soundcommunitysolutions.org/ ) and serves as a 
consultant to small businesses and  nonprofits.        
Marsha  Banks is founder and Executive Director of Amiracle4sure (details at
http://www.amiracle4sure.org/)   which  helps women and men coming out of prison by mentoring them. 

Laws like  this proposal, to limit the rights of felons, are based on a view that says once  you’ve been to prison you will never change for the better and you will
never reenter society.  They   arise from a ‘lock them up and throw away the key’ mentality.  The felons   I know are ready to admit that they made mistakes in the past, and they have   paid the penalty of incarceration, job loss, weakened family ties. They have   worked hard, found strength through faith, and become people I am proud to know and consider a friend. They have changed their lives and are working to help   others make those same changes.

 But who  among us has not made mistakes when we were young, mistakes that in some cases   could have gotten us on the wrong side of the law. 
Have we changed since those days? I think so. So each of us can support
the idea that change is possible.

 Sadly, our  prisons are overflowing because of the ‘lock them up and throw away the key’  approach to dealing with people who break the law. But since our commonwealth’s  Secretary of Corrections has said repeatedly ‘we cannot build our way out of  this,’ he clearly does not share that mentality.  He is putting PA tax
money to work to help reentering exoffenders, and our coalition is proud to be
part of the effort to help these reentering citizens do so successfully. As
Sec. Wetzel has stated on many occasions, 95% of those incarcerated in PA will
be released. It is in our best interest that they reenter
successfully.

When this happens, the result is less crime and more taxpayers – a result I think this  committee can support.

There are  many laws in existence that penalize felons regardless of the changes they may  have made, and these make it difficult for people coming out of prison to find  housing, find jobs, and a new life.

 I ask that this committee not add to the burden these reentering citizens face by approving  HB 480

 Thank you.