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ST. PAUL, Minn. — Those with criminal records in Minnesota will have a better chance of getting to the interview phase of the hiring process, under a new law that will go into effect next year.

Gov. Mark Dayton last week signeda measureknown as the “ban the box” bill, which will prohibit most employers from asking about a prospective employee’s criminal history on the application form.

“People need a chance to really talk in person, to really tell their story,” Kissy Mason of Minnetonka told KARE.

Mason was among the ex-offenders who met with lawmakers to build support for the bill, which passed with large majorities in both chambers of the legislature.

A college graduate with a solid work history, Mason does well in job interviews. But still dreads seeing this question on job applications:

“Have you ever pled guilty or no contest to a crime, been convicted of a crime, had adjudication withheld or prosecution deferred?”

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From fair-housing advocates to felons, dozens of people lined up Tuesday to tell lawmakers that laws designed to give reformed offenders a second chance are failing and should be overhauled.

“If you or someone you know has a criminal record, please raise your hand,” Justin Terrell, a program manager for Justice 4 All, asked the crowded room at a legislative hearing Tuesday on state expungement laws designed to give deserving lower-level offenders a clean slate. Nearly every hand shot up, including those of some lawmakers on both sides.

Among the witnesses were Emily Souther, a 30-year-old mother from Spicer who can’t complete her nursing studies because of her juvenile record, and James Cannon, a counselor who said he found work only because an assault conviction stemming from a fight in college was successfully sealed.

The emerging theme: Despite their best efforts, offenders find it difficult to move on unless their records are sealed.

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With all the Republican obstructionism and Democratic spinelessness in Washington, not to mention the distractions of the Obamacare website, it can be hard to feel good about politics at all — let alone tap into the sort of optimism that inspires and motivates many of us in the first place. Here, then, is a story of a small statewide organization that brought a multi-billion-dollar, multinational corporation to heel.

Minnesota has the worst-in-the-nation racial jobs gap. In 2011, for instance, 18 percent of African Americans in the Twin Cities were unemployed — more than three times the unemployment rate for whites in the city. This stems from broader problems in the criminal justice system in which Minnesota has historically had one of most disproportionate rates of incarceration for African Americans as compared with whites. While, thanks to criminal justice reform, that rate has fallen — from 23:1 in the 1980s and 90s to 9:1 in 2005, that still means a lot of African Americans in Minnesota have a criminal record stemming not just from their past wrongdoings but from a skewed criminal justice system that convicted and sentenced African Americans more frequently and harshly than whites.

One step in unraveling these dynamics and helping close the racial jobs gap in Minnesota would be gaining equal access to jobs for those with criminal records.… Continue reading »

Target Corp.’s decision to Ban the Box is a victory for many ex-offenders, and a wise and moral move for the wildly popular discounter.

But it would be a shame to ignore the impressive back story that undoubtedly influenced Target’s evolution.

Minnesota is the third state to implement Ban the Box, which goes into effect Jan. 1. The law mandates that employers wait until a prospective employee is being interviewed to ask about a criminal past.

For nearly three years, a grass-roots effort has been building on Minneapolis’ North Side in support of the change. The effort began in April 2011 when leaders from TakeAction Minnesota, a network of people working for social justice, held a series of meetings asking North Siders to share personal stories and ideas for strengthening community and families.

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In an overflow meeting at the Capri Theater, executives with Target Corporation engaged in a dialog about how corporate hiring policies prevent people with criminal arrest – disproportionately people of color – from securing a job.

The community meeting was organized by TakeAction Minnesota through its Justice 4 All, fair hiring campaign.

Jim Rowader, Target’s vice president of employee and labor relations, announced during the meeting that the company would institute a nationwide ban on the checkbox included on employment applications that screens for an applicant’s past criminal history. Officials with TakeAction said the move is a significant step in removing a key employment barrier for those with arrest records from one of the nation’s largest employers.

“Ending racism in employment demands the leadership of Minneapolis’ Northside community,” said TakeAction Minnesota’s executive director, Dan McGrath. “No matter their credentials and work ethic, the fact is that there are structural barriers in place that stop people from getting jobs. Our Justice 4 All campaign was launched by leaders from this community so that no one who has been locked up is locked out of a job and a positive future.”

McGrath said TakeAction Minnesota has worked for more than two years to build a base of leadership on the Northside to address inequities in employment…

Click here for the full article.… Continue reading »

Target plans to stop asking prospective employees about their criminal records in initial job applications at all of its U.S. stores, a company spokesperson confirmed to The Huffington Post on Tuesday.

The Minneapolis-based company had been facing pressure to do so from grassroots advocacy group TakeAction Minnesota. Target nevertheless reserved the right to ask about criminal backgrounds after the completion of an applicant’s first interview.

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Sanctions that make it more difficult for ex-offenders to obtain jobs, housing and even basic documents like drivers’ licenses only serve to drive them back to jail. With that in mind, a growing number of states and municipalities now prohibit public agencies — and in some cases private employers — from asking about a job applicant’s criminal history until the applicant reaches the interview stage or gets a conditional job offer. These eminently sensible “ban the box” laws are intended to let ex-offenders prove their qualifications before criminal history issues enter the equation.

Earlier this year Minnesota extended its existing law to cover private employers. Now, the Minneapolis-based Target Corporation, one of the nation’s largest employers, has announced that it will remove questions about criminal history from its job applications throughout the country. The announcement represents an important victory for the grassroots community group TakeAction Minnesota, which had been pressuring the company to change.

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Target Corp. will roll out a national program early next year that will eliminate the box on employment applications that asks job seekers whether they have a criminal record.

The initiative, part of a budding “Ban the Box” movement across the country, calls for employers to wait until a prospective employee is being interviewed or has a provisional job offer before inquiring whether he or she has a criminal past. The idea is that ex-offenders will have a better chance at getting a job if they’re not eliminated at the very beginning of their job search.

“It’s a big deal in the sense that people with criminal records are going to be given a better chance at employment,” said Dan Oberdorfer, an employment lawyer with the Minneapolis law firm Leonard Street and Deinard. “So earlier in the process employers will have a completely open mind.”

…

Greta Bergstrom, communications director for TakeAction Minnesota, said Target’s recent actions are in response to a two-year campaign the group organized involving a 200-person public action in the lobby of Target’s headquarters, a hundred individuals with past records filing job applications at Target and being rejected, a visit to Target’s shareholder meeting and numerous meetings, e-mails and phone calls with Target executives.… Continue reading »

Minnesota-based Target Corp. says it’s eliminating, nationally, the box on forms that asks if job applicants have criminal histories.

A new Minnesota law requires private employers in the state to take the criminal history box off applications by the end of the year. Target Vice President Jim Rowader says the company is voluntarily expanding that approach for all U.S. applicants, while at the same time trying to make sure that only the most serious crimes show up on the background reports that hiring managers see.

…

Rowader made the comments to a north Minneapolis audience of hundreds as part of a panel to address unemployment among ex-offenders that was organized by the advocacy group Take Action Minnesota.

For two years, the group has been urging Target to hire more ex-offenders.

For the full article, click here.… Continue reading »

The Twin Cities region has one of the country’s widest racial gaps in employment, according to the Economic Policy Institute. The advocacy group Take Action Minnesota says one reason for that gap is the reluctance of employers to hire people with criminal records, who are disproportionately likely to be African-Americans.

The group has been working with Target Corp., one of the largest employers in Minnesota, to address the issue. The two organizations will engage in a public meeting tonight to discuss Target’s practices regarding job applicants with criminal records…

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Jeana Raines got her life back on Tuesday, as the Minnesota Board of Pardons wisely forgave and erased long-ago transgressions. The mother of three has since paid restitution for check forgery and earned two college degrees.

The story of Raines and six other Minnesotans, also pardoned, couldn’t come at a more fitting hour. Because also this week, hundreds of other Minnesotans will humbly recall past criminal acts.

We need only look in the mirror to see them.

Like Raines, these Minnesotans broke the law, some by selling drugs, others by arson or indecent exposure. Unlike Raines, they never got caught, thus granted the freedom to mature and move into full adult lives to test their infinite potential…

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A few hours before the cops clapped handcuffs on him, James Cannon, a student at the University of Minnesota, was feeling better than ever about his prospects for the future: He’d just handed in his last college paper and was looking forward to a well-paying career in the medical field.

But as he celebrated at the bar that night, he had a few too many drinks and traded insults with a stranger. The words led to blows, and someone called the police, who caught Cannon holding onto the stranger by his backpack and charged him with attempted theft. For years after that, whenever Cannon applied for a job, he had to check off a box denoting his criminal record.

The once-promising young college graduate found himself working in a warehouse for about $8 an hour, picking up boxes of mashed potatoes that had fallen off a conveyer belt. “I never saw myself doing that kind of job,” he said. “But you have to be humble when you have a record.”

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The system is broken and it needs to be fixed.

For Justin Terrell it is just that simple. The current way the country goes about servicing and caring for its poor is in dysfunction. In the eyes of Terrell, something has to change, and he is at the forefront of a growing movement for change. Make no mistake, Terrell is not just a voice for change, he is quickly becoming an agent for change. The 32-year-old former college football running back, is attacking poverty in the same bruising style in which he ran the ball.

“For the past 10 years I’ve done direct service work,” said Terrell, who is the program manager for TakeAction Minnesota’s Justice 4 All campaign. “After doing 10 years of really cool work I was dismayed at the way the system is set up to keep people poor.”

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Instead of employing capable and qualified workers, many claim the Target Corporation would rather employ unfair hiring practices that disproportionately exclude African-Americans.

Ten African-American Minnesotans filed formal complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) claiming they were wrongfully denied employment based on their past run-ins with the criminal justice system. In a press conference held outside of the Hennepin County Government Center, members of TakeAction Minnesota, the St. Paul branch of the NAACP and a woman who said her offer for employment was rescinded by Target once a misdemeanor conviction came to light, called on the retail giant to end its practice of using past criminal transgressions to deny employment. The group said they have learned of 150 applicants who were denied employment based on past criminal transgressions.

The group said Target is unnecessarily discriminating against applicants of color who have criminal records in their past, but who are presently qualified for the jobs for which they are applying.

Read more… Continue reading »

Instead of employing capable and qualified workers, many claim the Target Corporation would rather employ unfair hiring practices that disproportionately exclude African-Americans.

Ten African-American Minnesotans filed formal complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) claiming they were wrongfully denied employment based on their past run-ins with the criminal justice system. In a press conference held outside of the Hennepin County Government Center, members of TakeAction Minnesota, the St. Paul branch of the NAACP and a woman who said her offer for employment was rescinded by Target once a misdemeanor conviction came to light, called on the retail giant to end its practice of using past criminal transgressions to deny employment. The group said they have learned of 150 applicants who were denied employment based on past criminal transgressions.

The group said Target is unnecessarily discriminating against applicants of color who have criminal records in their past, but who are presently qualified for the jobs for which they are applying.

Read more… Continue reading »