Friday Forum -- Racially-Just Policing on Campus – Mass ACLU

9/20/2021

Dear FSU Member,

Friday 4:15 -  (contact FSU or Steve Striffler for Zoom information).

Please join the FSU (and other campus unions) for a short presentation from representatives of the Mass ACLU (bios below) about their Racially-Just Policing Model Policy for universities and colleges in Massachusetts.  The policy – which will be publicly released at the end of the month -- was based on input from state community colleges and universities. It is in response to multiple policing incidents on campuses involving people of color who were reported as suspicious while engaging in innocuous activities. The policy was developed to help institutions build structures to receive and implement community feedback about their policing needs. The ultimate goal of the model policy is to help institutions proactively address bias-based policing incidents.  Discussion will follow.

Joining us on Friday from the ACLU will be:

Rahsaan Hall is the Director of the Racial Justice Program for the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts. In this role Rahsaan helps develop the ACLU of Massachusetts’ integrated advocacy approach to address racial justice issues. Through legislative advocacy, litigation and community engagement, the program works on issues that deeply impact communities of color and historically disenfranchised communities. Rahsaan also manages the ACLU of Massachusetts' What a Difference a DA Makes campaign to educate state residents about the power and influence of district attorneys.

Matthew Segal is Legal Director of the ACLU of Massachusetts, where he leads a team of civil rights lawyers. He has litigated cases on wrongful convictions, police accountability, privacy, the criminalization of poverty, the First Amendment, and immigrants’ rights. Matt’s cases at ACLUM have temporarily halted President Trump’s first Muslim ban; dismissed over 60,000 drug charges in the Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan lab scandals; resulted in the release of over 6,000 people from jails and prisons due to the COVID-19 pandemic; yielded the first federal court order requiring someone with opioid use disorder to be provided medication for addiction treatment (MAT) while incarcerated; and made Massachusetts the second state to recognize constitutional protections for cell phone location data.

Jessica Lewis joined the ACLU of Massachusetts as a staff attorney in January 2019; she works on issues related to police and district attorney accountability as well as to the First Amendment. Prior to joining ACLUM, Jessica was a legal fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center in the LGBT Rights / Special Litigation practice group, where she focused on litigating cases against hate groups.

Steve Striffler

FSU President

For information on the FSU, links to our contract and bargaining updates, and a calendar of events, see the FSU webpage