by MOSES Publications | Mar 12, 2026 | Advocacy, Juvenile Justice, Prisons, WISDOM Old Law
Juvenile Life Without Parole Legislation Left on the Table Again
By Sherry Reames
I’ve been following the work of WayJ (Wisconsin Alliance for Youth Justice) with admiration since the fall of 2021. I’ve been impressed with the systematic way they laid the groundwork for a Wisconsin law banning life without parole sentences for juvenile offenders, and by their continuing determination to get such a bill through the Legislature. I’ve been looking forward to the day when I could share the good news of their success with other members of MOSES and explain how they achieved it. But, evidently, 2026 is not the year that will happen.
WayJ’s strategy has continued to evolve. Early in their existence they joined forces with a national organization on this issue, The Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth. After studying model legislation and messaging that had worked in other states – over half of which have now banned juvenile life sentences – WayJ leaders found legislators to introduce bills in both houses of the Wisconsin Legislature and embarked on a lobbying campaign to persuade other legislators to sign on as sponsors. In the 2021-’22 legislative session, they started with a bipartisan team of authors and recruited two dozen more sponsors, mostly Assembly Democrats. The bills died in committee.
In 2023-’24, WayJ focused mostly on Republicans. They asked Sen. Jesse James (R) and Rep. Todd Novak (R ) to author the bills they wanted, and they focused their lobbying on conservative-learning members of key committees. WayJ’s campaign that winter included a well-attended public hearing, with powerful testimonies from former juvenile lifers who have gone on to become valuable members of society. The legislators were listening. In February 2024, the bills actually seemed to have a good chance of becoming law, but they never got a floor vote, because the Assembly called an early end to the session and members went home to campaign.
When the 2025-26 session started, WayJ went to work even faster, starting with the same Republican authors, and did even more carefully organized lobbying with key legislators. Their bills got assigned to the appropriate committees and picked up quite a few sponsors, but the public hearing expected in January or early February never even got scheduled. And then there were no more hopes for this year. On Feb. 13, Assembly leaders announced that the session was again ending early, with the last floor votes scheduled for Feb. 19.
In the coming weeks, the leaders of WayJ will be trying to figure out what went wrong this year and deciding what changes to make next time. I will keep paying attention, both because I want them to succeed and because I believe that MOSES and WISDOM can learn from their example.
by MOSES Publications | Mar 12, 2026 | Advocacy, Calls to Action, Housing, RJAC Racial Justice for All Children
HUD Reveals Its Intentions for Homeless Services, and We Need to Be Prepared
By John Lemke
In November of last year, HUD released a Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) to homeless services agencies across the country. It included drastic and detrimental changes to how HUD wants to use federal money to address the problem of homelessness. The changes were immediately challenged by lawsuits from 20 states and did not fare well. However, per the recent funding bills just passed on Feb. 3, HUD is expected to issue another NOFO by June 1, giving the agency another chance at drastically reshaping federally funded homeless services. In preparation for that, we need to know what to watch out for, and the November NOFO, even though it’s been rescinded, gives us a number of important policies targeted by HUD that we need to protect.
I want to highlight three especially destructive and cruel changes proposed in the November 2025 NOFO:
1) “Housing first” has been the best practice for addressing homelessness for decades. Get people into housing and then work with them to address any other needs they have. On July 24, the President ordered HUD to stop following this successful practice, thinking instead that a homeless person is homeless because of their own problems and failures. The November NOFO drastically reduced the funding that can go to permanent housing and rapid rehousing programs like those offered by The Road Home, Porchlight, the YWCA, the Salvation Army, Housing Initiatives, Urban Triage, and Tellurian. Roughly two-thirds of the money previously spent on permanent supportive housing and rapid rehousing programs must go instead to transitional housing and supportive services, including street outreach.
2) HUD indicates that agencies’ requests for funds can be denied if they now or in the past used “racial preferences,” used harm-reduction measures like safe injection sites, or defined gender in ways other than strictly binary. We know that many trans youth, especially those who’ve recently aged out of foster care, have limited housing choices and often end up in the homeless-services system. Preventing agencies from focusing on their particular needs is cruel and damages the entire community.
3) The NOFO also requires that agencies providing services to homeless people must verify their immigration status and cooperate with law enforcement. We already know that people who need other sorts of services will not pursue them for fear of ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), so if this requirement goes into effect, we can anticipate that many homeless families who could otherwise be helped by services already working in their community will be afraid to use them.
When HUD publishes a new NOFO in the next few months and we see policy changes like these, what can we do to push back?
We need to take advice from Torrie Kopp Mueller, the continuum of care coordinator for Madison and Dane County since 2017. She deeply understands the NOFO process and is a great resource.
We should also speak to our leaders in state government. There is state money that could be directed to compensate for losses we’re most likely going to suffer. Perhaps homeless services could be something we talk to legislators about when Madison Action Day 2027 comes around.
by MOSES Publications | Mar 12, 2026 | Life After Prison, Newsletter
From Prison to Law School: Dant’e Cottingham’s Journey Since March 2022
By Sherry Reames
The Wisconsin Examiner headline, “Formerly incarcerated teacher instructs UW law students about criminal justice system,” caught my attention in late January; and I was even more interested when I recognized that formerly incarcerated teacher as Dant’e Cottingham. Dant’e was the subject of a “Returning Citizen” profile in the Oct/Nov 2022 issue of the MOSES Newsletter, half a year after his release. At that point he was working part-time both as an EXPO leader in Racine and a WisHope recovery coach in Waukesha. I also used to see him regularly as a fellow volunteer with the WISDOM task force on Old Law/Parole and Commutation. But I hadn’t talked with him recently, and I jumped at the chance to interview him about his current work with the Remington Center at University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
As Dant’e explained, his connection with the Remington Center began during his incarceration, when he received help from some of Professor Kate Finley’s students through the LAIP (Legal Assistance to Incarcerated People) program. After his release on parole, he was invited several times to speak to students in law school classes, and both he and the faculty recognized the need for law students to learn more from speakers with lived experience in the system. That was the origin of a new course, “The Criminal Justice System: A Lived Experience Perspective,” which Dant’e is team-teaching this spring with Professor Alan Stevenson.
As described by the Examiner, this course addresses every stage of the system, from arrest and trial to the re-entry process, plus the systemic inequality in criminal justice, advocacy for reform, and future directions. Guest speakers this semester have included Wisconsin Department of Corrections Secretary Jared Hoy, Wood County District Attorney Jonathan Barnett, at least one public defender, and men and women who have experienced incarceration themselves. Assigned readings in the course include additional autobiographies of people with lived experience of the system.
Dant’e’s job title at the Remington Center is “Re-Entry and Outreach Support Specialist.” Most of his work consists of connecting current prisoners with the Remington Center’s clinical law programs and other resources they need for help with applications for parole or sentence adjustments, appeals, treatment programs, recovery from trauma, and successful re-entry.
Dant’e is an excellent public speaker, and he remains deeply committed to his larger project of educating the public in a way that fosters understanding and empathy for the individual human experiences of incarcerated people. He also told me that he will soon be publishing a memoir about his own journey as a juvenile lifer who has completely turned his life around. Details will be posted on his website, Dantecottingham.com.
by MOSES Publications | Mar 12, 2026 | MOSES Groups, Newsletter
Check out the updated MOSES website at https://www.mosesmadison.org. It has been completely refreshed and modernized! Megh Designs, a professional developer, guided the design and structure, which was fully implemented by our MOSES Website Team: Ann Lacy, Eric Howland, Pam Oliver, and Barbie Jackson. New features include a comprehensive overview of MOSES on the Homepage with notices of current interest at the top, in-depth presentation of our organizational teams and task forces, collected news and commentary in a searchable blog structure, and access to our past yearbooks and newsletters.
by MOSES Publications | Mar 12, 2026 | Calls to Action, Community Issues, Immigration
Building Unity for Nonviolent Action!
By Ken Warren
On Jan. 24, I was one of several MOSES members who spontaneously showed up at James Reeb Unitarian Universalist Congregation for their monthly People, Peace, and Planet potluck. This particular one had been publicized as a kind of a kick-off for Building Unity for Nonviolent Action (BU4NVA). Speakers included John Nichols, Ajak Johnson, Everett Mitchell, and Rebe Silvey. During the week preceding the event, organizers started to recognize that it was going to be very well attended and arranged to put the presentations on Zoom. You can find a recording of the meeting on the website linked below.
That decision was fortuitous. I never heard an actual estimate of the crowd’s size, but I estimated the number of attendees at 300 to 400. The building was bulging at the seams!
After a welcome by emcee Tim Cordon, Ajak Johnson of Badger Collective got the audience energized and inspired. Their message was to emphasize the importance and strength of collective action. John Nichols followed Johson to the podium and continued to rev up the crowd with emphasis on the human rights violations going on right before our eyes.
Nichols then brought Rebe Silvey to the stage to remind us of the work that Voces de la Frontera has been doing and continues to faithfully perform within the Latinx community. Finally, Judge/Pastor/Activist Everett Mitchell brought everyone to their feet with a rousing speech about the dangers we face as a society – and a challenge to each of us to be ready to act.
Since the Jan. 24 program, at least 25 local, neighborhood, and faith-based groups have formally endorsed and become involved in the movement. Building Unity has already held several training sessions and has more planned. These early sessions filled up quickly, so many of us are still in need of training in ways to be effective when and if the time comes. A weekend of training is planned for March 14-15.
There has been great success in getting individuals to sign the BU4NVA Solidarity statement, but the group is also working to encourage local organizations and churches to add their names to the list of movement supporters. As part of that work, Tim Cordon and Rebe Silvey spoke at our MOSES General Meeting on Feb. 8.
Individual action teams continue to organize and disseminate information, but more action teams are needed. Anyone who knows of a few people in their neighborhood or congregation who are concerned about the tactics of our federal agencies, particularly ICE, are encouraged to form an action team. Visit the BU4NVA website for more information about BU4NVA, including ways to get involved and a schedule of upcoming training opportunities: https://www.buildingunitywisconsin.org/building-unity-for-nonviolent-action/
