The Arise policy and campaign teams gave updates on criminal justice reform, voting rights, Medicaid expansion and other issue priorities during Alabama Arise Action’s annual meeting last week. Sen. Kirk Hatcher, D-Montgomery, also called in to provide insight from the legislative side of the 2021 regular session.
(Note: The video captions were generated live during the meeting and include some typos. We apologize for any resulting confusion or inconvenience.)
The Alabama Legislature’s 2021 regular session has been a difficult one, to say the least. Public access remains limited, and lawmakers have advanced some of the most damaging bills in years. And many legislators have forced attention onto high-profile, controversial bills to foment conflict and remove focus from priorities that would benefit all Alabamians. But even so, together we have opportunities to create significant positive change in the session’s waning days.
Legislators have advanced bills to increase penalties for violation of the monuments bill passed three years ago. This law prohibits removal of monuments to slavery and oppression erected primarily to symbolize Jim Crow policies and intimidate advocates for civil rights for Black people in the 1950s and ‘60s. At the same time, the Legislature has halted movement on HB 8 by Rep. Juandalynn Givan, D-Birmingham, which would repeal the existing bill’s ban on removing Confederate monuments.
The legacy of oppression enshrined in these monuments to long-dead traitors continues even now. The House this year passed HB 445 by Rep. Allen Treadaway, R-Morris. This anti-protest bill would have seen Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth charged and imprisoned for organizing marches. And much of the rhetoric supporting this bill was copied straight from Bull Connor’s playbook. This included supporters’ proclamations that the bill would secure law and order and accusations that “outside agitators” were behind protests.
Bills to restrict Alabamians’ voting rights also have advanced this year. These include bans on curbside voting that would prevent legally required and morally necessary reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities and older Alabamians.
These harmful high-profile bills have not distracted from another legislative priority: protecting businesses that have harmed people. Early in the session, lawmakers fast-tracked SB 30 by Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur. This bill provided broad corporate immunity from lawsuits related to coronavirus exposure or contraction of COVID-19.
The news isn’t all bad, though. Even with the Legislature’s deprioritization and blocking of reform bills, some substantial reforms still have been advancing. And several good bills are in position to become law before the session’s end.
HB 129 by Rep. Chris Pringle, R-Mobile, would end the practice of suspending driver’s licenses for nonpayment of fines and fees. This practice is cruel and counterproductive. Forcing people to break the law to drive to work and see to their basic needs shows a misguided belief that punishment is the answer to poverty. This bill has been the subject of much discussion in the House Judiciary Committee, where Pringle has gathered considerable support for this needed reform.
Next, HB 107 by Rep. Chris England, D-Tuscaloosa, would repeal the state’s archaic, broken Habitual Felony Offender Act (HFOA). Like all mandatory minimum laws, the HFOA creates harsh punishment out of a mistaken belief that keeping people locked up longer for crimes that don’t warrant long sentences, even under Alabama’s heavily punitive sentencing standards, makes communities safer.
In reality, the HFOA keeps people locked up long after they are unlikely to reoffend, both because they have worked hard to gain education and skills that make repeat offenses unlikely or because they have “aged out” of criminality. Statistics show 70-year-olds rarely commit crimes, yet the state has many older adults locked away on the bad reasoning that they pose a danger to the community. HB 107 has passed the House Judiciary Committee over opposition and is in position to pass the full House.
While HB 129 and HB 107 face significant opposition that has slowed their movement, other sentencing reforms have advanced further and are in good position to become law. HB 24 by Rep. Jim Hill, R-Odenville, would allow people convicted under the HFOA to petition for resentencing if they would be sentenced under the state’s less severe sentencing guidelines today.
Hill’s HB 73 would create community corrections programs in every judicial circuit. The bill would create community corrections programs for each judicial circuit in Alabama. These programs allow people to serve sentences in their communities. This approach reduces repeat offenses by allowing people to maintain support structures as they rebuild their lives. These programs are also smart budgetary decisions, reducing the state’s supervision costs and reducing horrific overcrowding in the state’s prisons.
HB 73 would go a long way toward allowing Alabamians to rebuild their lives after a conviction. And importantly, it’s just one step from final passage in the Legislature. With just a few legislative days remaining, HB 73 is in excellent position to become law. Email your senator today and ask them to support HB 73 on the Senate floor.
Alternative courts aren’t the only area where substantial progress has occurred in passing criminal justice reforms. HB 394 by Rep. Andrew Sorrell, R-Muscle Shoals, would rein in the abusive practices of civil asset forfeiture. This tactic often is used to take people’s personal property without a criminal conviction ‒ or even a charge. (SB 210 by Orr is the Senate version.) Alabama doesn’t report racial data on forfeitures, but research in other states has shown they are disproportionately used against Black people.
Far from the supposed “drug kingpin” justification for civil asset forfeiture, this practice is used heavily in Alabama to seize small amounts of cash and property. Because these seizures are classified as civil actions, forfeiture victims are not provided attorneys. Often, the amounts seized are less than the fee that an attorney would charge to fight the seizure.
HB 394 would rein in some of the worst abuses of civil asset forfeiture. Alabamians deserve to have their personal property protected from seizure when they haven’t been convicted of a crime. But under our state’s civil asset forfeiture policies, people can lose their property, including their home or their only vehicle, without being convicted – or even charged. And law enforcement has an incentive to seize property because agencies are often allowed to keep the property they take.
The Senate passed SB 210 just this week. And HB 394 has cleared the House Judiciary Committee. If the full House votes to pass HB 394, it would go to the governor once the Senate approves a straightforward technical fix to make it identical to SB 210.
HB 394 would increase due process protections for Alabamians who can’t afford to fight to keep the property they own. Email your representative today and ask them to support HB 394’s reforms to civil asset forfeiture.
Even though the Legislature has spent time this session advancing bills that do nothing to help Alabamians, good opportunities remain to advance reforms that have built momentum during this session. But as time grows short, it’s essential for legislators to hear from constituents urging them to advance legislation to help Alabamians.
With your help, we can help push these bills across the finish line. With your help, we can make Alabama more equitable, inclusive and just.
As the Alabama Legislature approaches the 2021 regular session’s final days, both state budgets are halfway to passage. The Education Trust Fund (ETF) budget has passed in the Senate and is in the House’s education budget committee. The General Fund (GF) budget, which funds all non-education services, has cleared the House and awaits Senate committee approval. Despite the COVID-19 recession, both budgets eked out small increases – 3% in the GF and 6% in the ETF. This will allow pay raises for teachers and state employees. It also will fund one-time additional 2022 teacher units and a new salary matrix for certified math and science teachers.
While budgets progressed, the Senate divided over whether to pass a gambling bill that would increase revenue for one or both. After Sen. Del Marsh’s lottery and gaming bill failed March 9, Sens. Garlan Gudger, R-Cullman, and Jim McClendon, R-Springville, introduced lottery bills. Meanwhile, Marsh, R-Anniston, introduced both a new lottery and a new gaming bill.
The Senate may consider some combination of these measures later this session. If approved by legislators and voters, expansion of gambling could increase state revenues anywhere from $118 million to $550 million. (Arise takes no position for or against gambling legislation.)
A big change on the health care front this year is the prominent role of Medicaid expansion in legislative discussions, both on and off the chamber floors. Gov. Kay Ivey can propose expansion through administrative steps, but lawmakers still control the purse strings. So legislative advocacy is essential!
As the pandemic highlights the need for rigorous health data, Alabama had been one of only two states lacking a statewide hospital discharge database. Now we’ll be shedding that dubious distinction with the enactment of HB 210 by Rep. Paul Lee, R-Dothan, a bill that Arise supported.
The Alabama Department of Public Health (ADPH) has been the target of several proposals to increase political control over the agency’s leadership and decision-making. McClendon’s SB 240, for example, would abolish the State Board of Health, the medical body that appoints the state health officer, and make ADPH’s director a gubernatorial appointment. Other bills would limit state and county health officials’ authority to declare health emergencies. One such measure, SB 97 by Sen. Tom Whatley, R-Auburn, passed the Senate in early April.
Several criminal justice improvements have moved forward this year. These include partial reform of sentencing under the Habitual Felony Offender Act (HFOA) and expanded alternatives to imprisonment. Bigger reforms like HFOA repeal and abolition of driver’s license suspension have been slowed due to opposition, though. That inaction has persisted even in the face of a U.S. Department of Justice lawsuit over unconstitutional prison conditions.
Efforts to protect and expand voting rights continue to face an uphill battle. Bills prohibiting curbside voting have advanced, despite the practice’s success in Mississippi and other states. Meanwhile, a bill allowing no-cause absentee voting stalled, as did measures on early voting and same-day voter registration. Legislation improving voting rights restoration did advance, but only after removal of a provision that would have ended a de facto poll tax: the requirement for people with convictions to pay all fines and fees before regaining voting rights.
Arise’s Jim Carnes provides an update on several good bills that won committee approval, including legislation to repeal Alabama’s broken and harmful Habitual Felony Offender Act. He also acknowledges a disturbing trend of bills that aim to limit the power of Alabama’s public health officials to respond to pandemics and other emergencies.
As the Alabama Legislature reaches the midpoint of this year’s regular session, Arise’s Celida Soto Garcia brings us up to date with the session so far. Lawmakers sadly have neglected many key needs while advancing numerous bills that would infringe on the civil rights of Alabamians. We need you to speak out for a better Alabama.
After a year of darkness, the light at the end of the tunnel is finally in sight. Promising vaccine news offers hope that public health officials can rein in COVID-19 in the coming months. And as our state and nation seek policy solutions to rebuild from the pandemic’s health and economic devastation, Alabama Arise will seek to advance equity and shared prosperity for Alabamians who are marginalized and excluded.
That vital work won’t be fast or easy. In the meantime, the pandemic’s harrowing toll continues to grow. COVID-19 has killed more than 1.5 million people worldwide, including more than 3,900 Alabamians, and sickened tens of millions. It has fueled a deep recession, caused millions of layoffs and left more than 40% of U.S. children living in households struggling to make ends meet. It has stretched hospitals to the breaking point and disrupted education, commerce and social interactions in every community.
COVID-19 has created suffering on a staggering scale. It also has highlighted long-standing economic and racial disparities and underscored the urgency of ending them. A new legislative session and a new presidency will offer new opportunities to right those wrongs in 2021 and beyond.
The most immediate needs will require federal action. Congress must extend state aid and additional unemployment insurance (UI) benefits before they expire this month. But those extensions should be just a down payment on a more comprehensive response.
Arise will urge further UI benefit increases and more federal relief to help states avoid layoffs and damaging cuts. We also will advocate for emergency rental and mortgage assistance and a 15% boost to food assistance under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). And we’ll support regulatory efforts to lift harmful Medicaid and SNAP barriers created in recent years.
We’ll also keep working for better state policies when the Legislature returns in February. Our top focus will be Medicaid expansion, which we’ll pursue along with partners in the Cover Alabama Coalition. Expansion would cover more than 340,000 Alabamians with low incomes and ease the financial strain on rural hospitals. It also would attack structural health care disparities that led COVID-19 to take a disproportionate toll on Black Alabamians.
Arise’s work won’t stop there. We’ll support legislation to expand voting rights and ensure broadband internet access for all Alabamians. We’ll seek to increase consumer protections and overhaul the state’s criminal justice system. And we’ll fight to untax groceries once and for all.
Breakthroughs on many of these issues won’t be fast or easy. But together, we’ll emerge from dark times into the light of a brighter, more inclusive future for Alabama.
Alabama’s 2021 legislative session begins Feb. 2. It will not proceed as usual given the extraordinary times in which we live. But we still need to be prepared to move our issues forward. This series of briefings will both inform and equip us to act strategically to continue the work for a better Alabama for all.
Please join us at any or all of these sessions! Registration is required, so please register at the link under each description.
We will preview what we expect for the coming session, including what will be different. We also will share legislative advocacy tips for this (temporary) new normal. Click here to register for this session.
More people are voting than ever before. We will talk about ways to protect and strengthen voting rights in Alabama. Click here to register for this session.
We will discuss Alabama’s unjust criminal justice system – and how to fix it. Click here to register for this session.
Budgets are moral documents. Let’s put our money where our values are. Our budget priorities should reflect our commitment to advancing economic and racial justice. Click here to register for this session.
Sentencing reform and universal broadband access are two new goals on Alabama Arise’s 2021 legislative agenda. Members voted for Arise’s issue priorities this week after nearly 300 people attended the organization’s online annual meeting Saturday. The seven issues chosen were:
“Arise believes in dignity, equity and justice for all Alabamians,” Alabama Arise executive director Robyn Hyden said. “And our 2021 issue priorities would break down many of the policy barriers that keep people in poverty. We can and will build a more inclusive future for our state.”
Alabama’s criminal justice system is broken and in desperate need of repair. The state’s prisons are violent and dangerously overcrowded. Exorbitant court fines and fees impose heavy burdens on thousands of families every year, taking a disproportionate toll on communities of color and families who are already struggling to make ends meet. And Alabama’s civil asset forfeiture policies let law enforcement seize people’s property even if they aren’t charged with a crime.
Arise will continue to seek needed reforms in those areas in the coming year. The organization also will work for repeal of the Habitual Felony Offender Act (HFOA), the state’s “three-strikes” law. The HFOA is an unjust driver of sentencing disparities and prison overcrowding in Alabama. The law lengthens sentences for a felony conviction after a prior felony conviction, even when the prior offense was nonviolent. Hundreds of people in Alabama are serving life sentences for non-homicide crimes because of the HFOA. Thousands more have had their sentences increased as a result. Repealing the law would reduce prison overcrowding and end some of Alabama’s most abusive sentencing practices.
The COVID-19 pandemic has illustrated the essential role that the internet plays in modern life. Remote work, education, health care and shopping are a reality for millions in our state today. But far too many Alabamians, especially in rural areas, can’t access the high-speed broadband that these services require. These access challenges also reveal a racial disparity: About 10% each of Black and Latino households have no internet subscription, compared to 6% of white households.
Policy solutions can facilitate the investments needed to ensure all Alabamians can stay connected. Lawmakers can help by guaranteeing that all communities have the right to own, operate or deploy their own broadband services. The Legislature also can enact targeted and transparent tax credits to promote broadband for underserved populations.
Listening is often an underdeveloped skill, yet it is critical for mutual understanding and working together for meaningful change. That’s why Arise is committed to listening to our members, to our allies and most importantly, to those directly affected by the work we do together. We depend on what we hear from you to guide our issue work and our strategies.
This year’s COVID-19 pandemic challenged us to be creative in finding ways to listen. Instead of our usual face-to-face meetings around the state, we hosted a series of six statewide online Town Hall Tuesdays. We held events every two weeks, starting in June and ending Sept. 1. We averaged 65 attendees at each session. Here’s some of what we heard from members and supporters:
Overviews of the town halls are below. Click the title for a PDF of the notes from the breakout sessions at each town hall.
June 23 – Money talks
We examined how to strengthen education, health care, child care and other services that help Alabamians make ends meet. And we explored ways to fund those services more equitably.
July 7 – Justice for all
We discussed Alabama’s unjust criminal justice system and how to fix it.
July 21 – Getting civic
Discussion focused on protecting voting rights and boosting Census responses during a pandemic.
Aug. 4 – Shared prosperity
We looked at policy solutions to boost opportunity and protect families from economic exploitation.
Aug. 18 – Feeding our families
We explored ways to increase household food security during and after the recession.
Sept. 1 – Closing the coverage gap
Discussion focused on how everyone can help expand Medicaid to ensure coverage for hundreds of thousands of struggling Alabamians. We also heard about the expansion campaign strategies of the Cover Alabama Coalition, headed by Arise campaign director Jane Adams.
Remember, we didn’t stop listening because the town halls ended. We want to hear from you, and we encourage you to contact the Arise organizer in your area:
We hope to see you at Arise’s online annual meeting Oct. 3!
The following is a joint statement from Alabama Arise, the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP and Greater Birmingham Ministries:
Our elected officials and appointed leaders should respect the full dignity, worth and humanity of all people they represent. We urge all political parties and public officials to acknowledge the harm that white supremacy continues to inflict upon Alabama. And we call upon them to dismantle white supremacist structures through intentional policy changes.
The cause of white supremacy permeates our state’s fundamental governing document. When the president of the 1901 constitutional convention, John Knox, was asked why Alabama needed a new constitution, his answer was clear: “to establish white supremacy in this state.”
Any celebration of Nathan Bedford Forrest of the Ku Klux Klan – a white supremacist terrorist organization – is contrary to the values that Alabamians expect from our leaders, elected officials and neighbors. In celebrating Forrest, Rep. Will Dismukes revealed he is unable or unwilling to represent the best interests of his constituents and his state. We condemn his actions in the strongest possible terms. We also understand this is not the first time Dismukes has celebrated the Confederacy or Forrest in such a manner. Therefore, we join with many other individuals and organizations across Alabama in calling for Dismukes to resign immediately.
Alabama’s need for racial justice and healing reaches far beyond any one individual. All elected officials must take a hard look at both their actions and the impacts of their policy decisions. Most lawmakers claim to support racial equality, but the results of their policy choices often do not match this claim.
Examples of this mismatch are unfortunately common in our state. The 2017 Memorial Preservation Act prevents localities from removing statues that “honor” the Confederacy without paying a steep fine or getting approval from a panel of legislators that to our knowledge has not approved a removal since the law was enacted. Lawmakers’ failure to expand Medicaid leaves a disproportionate share of African Americans without health insurance during a pandemic. And the absence of racial impact data prevents communities and legislators from evaluating the full effects of state policy choices.
While Dismukes dismisses the need for racial reconciliation in today’s society, we cannot remain ignorant of the truth. We all must reckon with these disparities created and maintained by structural policy barriers:
It’s time for more than talk. Denouncing and rejecting white supremacy is only the beginning. Lawmakers also must enact meaningful policy changes to break down institutional barriers to opportunity and justice for all Alabamians.
