Local Governments Collected $9 Billion in Fines And Fees in 2020
The use of fines and fees to generate revenue can be exploitative and a conflict of interest when relied on as an essential source of revenue. Using data from the …
Council on Policing Reforms and Race: Council Findings and Recommendations
The Council on Policing Reforms and Race released more than fifty recommendations to address policing and public safety. The Council is an independent, non-partisan initiative formed by the National Policing …
Electronic Monitoring Fees: A 50-State Survey of the Costs Assessed to People on E-Supervision
This report examines statutes and rules from all 50 states and D.C. to determine whether their codes authorize fees for electronic monitoring at any point in the justice system and to what extent. It explores statutes related to both pretrial release and post-sentencing supervision, the fee amounts authorized, consequences for nonpayment and, to a limited extent, fees at the local level.
Poor Not Guilty: The Fines and Fees Challenge
Poor Not Guilty: The Fines and Fees Challenge is an interactive educational tool based on a series of real-life experiences that highlight how fines and fees for petty offenses often create impossible situations for those experiencing poverty and/or homelessness.
Local Policy Guide: Fee Elimination and Debt Relief
This local policy guide gives local leaders a recommended process for eliminating fees via local legislation, budgetary processes and through the courts.
Local Policy Guide: Make Jail Phone Calls Free and Eliminate Commissions and Kickbacks on Commissary Items
This local policy guide gives local leaders three reform pathways for ensuring incarcerated people have access to basic needs and free communication.
Resolve Traffic Debt: Advocate Toolkit
North Carolina automatically suspends a person’s driver’s license for failure to pay court fees or fines for a motor vehicle offense. Approximately 300,000 North Carolinians have long-term driver’s license suspensions …
Why We Need to Stop Suspending and Revoking Driver’s Licenses Due to Debt
The Prosperity Now Scorecard rates states on their progress toward racial economic justice in several policy areas. The 2022 policy update includes an assessment of which states have ended the …
Local Policy Guide: Reforming Debt-Based Driver’s License Suspensions at the Local Level
This guide is designed to give local leaders the tools, process and resources they need to reform debt-based driving restrictions at the local level.
Inequitable Fines and Fees Hurt Vulnerable Communities. Now, Policymakers Have an Opportunity For Reform.
Before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, many individuals were forced to choose between paying fines and fees or their day-to-day needs. As the pandemic further exacerbated economic insecurity, many …