by MOSES Publications | Mar 1, 2025 | Events, Life After Prison, Prisons, Yearbook
Additional Learning Opportunities for MOSES and the Community in 2024
(1) “End the Lockdowns,” a community forum at First Unitarian Society on Feb. 1, presented dramatic testimony about the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Wisconsin’s overcrowded prisons. James Wilbur, outgoing director of prison inreach for WISDOM, described the squalid conditions inside Waupun and Green Bay in particular, and tragic personal stories were added by family members whose incarcerated loved ones had died or been severely injured as a result of abuse or neglect by prison staff.
Confronting the obvious need to alleviate this crisis, Mark Rice, director of WISDOM’s Transformational Justice Campaign, outlined some practical steps that Gov. Evers and the DOC could take to reduce the prison population; and two local state legislators, Sen. Kelda Roys and Rep. Shelia Stubbs, both D-Madison, suggested some smaller steps toward reform that might win enough bipartisan support to become law in the near future. The take-away message from the forum was to keep lobbying and educating more voters about the needed changes.
(2) Panel of Experts on Parole Issues: Also on Feb. 1, the UW Law School gathered a distinguished panel to discuss the pluses and minuses of the parole system in Wisconsin and elsewhere in the U.S. The panel included Ben Austen, author of Correction: Prison, Parole, and the Possibility of Reform; ACLU Staff Attorney Emma Shakeshaft; John Tate II, who chaired the Wisconsin Parole Commission from 2019 to 2022; and Danté Cottingham, a former juvenile lifer who received parole during Tate’s tenure. Among the issues they addressed were the intended purposes of parole, the susceptibility of parole boards to bias and politics, what actually works to encourage rehabilitation and successful re-entry, and how the system can be reformed to enable more successes. For more on parole, see the fuller account of this event in the MOSES Newsletter for February/March 2024 and our review of Austen’s important book.
(3) Lunch and Learn Fundraiser About Madison’s New SAFE House: On May 15, MOSES members and supporters gathered to hear a presentation by Delilah McKinney, about the special vulnerability of women during their re-entry from incarceration and the promise represented by Susan Burton’s SAFE Housing Network. McKinney shared her own inspiring journey: from dealing with post-prison trauma to becoming a peer specialist to help other women during re-entry, to learning from Burton how to meet newly released women’s need for secure housing until they get back on their feet, and to actually establishing the first such SAFE House in Wisconsin. Attendees at this event were encouraged to contribute financially to both the SAFE House and MOSES. The MOSES Newsletter also reviewed Burton’s book this year.
by MOSES Publications | Mar 1, 2025 | Advocacy, Prisons, WISDOM, Yearbook
Wisconsin Hears About Solitary Confinement
On April 23, 2024, in the state Capitol building, a panel of 10 spoke to a packed hearing room about the practice of solitary confinement in Wisconsin’s prisons and jails. The 70-plus listeners included five legislators and about twice that many aides; the panel included seven who had spent time in solitary, two ministers, and a woman who had recently lost her dad to suicide in solitary.
The first speaker was MOSES’s own Talib Akbar, who designed, and with the help of Edgewood College students built, a solitary confinement cell replica that is (as of December) on display at The Crossing on the UW campus. Akbar said that solitary changes people, alters them in some way. He began his volunteer effort to apprise the public about the realities of solitary in 2014 and has taken the cell, which people can actually sit in and experience, to various places in Madison, to different cities in Wisconsin, and to a few other states. He has also written a play, “Like an Animal in a Cage,” which has been performed by people who have spent time in solitary. He noted that the Wisconsin DOC has reduced maximum time in solitary from 360 days/year to 90, but said the practice needed to be ended entirely.
“Incarceration is one of the social deterrents to public health,” said Melissa Ludin from the ACLU. “A person who’s gone to prison is 12 times more likely to die than one who hasn’t been to prison. Incarceration causes PTSD, and solitary makes it even worse. Solitary is a jail within a prison.”
Ludin spent 100 days in solitary during an imprisonment in her youth; she was taken out only twice, for medical appointments. She still feels the long-term effects of that experience, though she’s been out since 2007.
Prince Rashad grew up in the early ‘80s and ended up in Green Bay Correctional Institution at age 18. In solitary, he became suicidal; “the experience made me more dangerous,” he said. He was sent to solitary six times; each time it was devastating.
“It brings no resolution or rehabilitation,” he said. “We need to align our criminal justice system with international human rights standards. Solitary confinement exacerbates existing psychological conditions — or starts new ones.”
Randy Forsterling said he was in Supermax for seven years and spent 360 days in solitary, so much time that it got to be routine, he said. He had friends who were “in the hole” for 20 to 30 years. When his mom died, he couldn’t even cry, he felt so stripped of his humanity. “People in solitary aren’t even seen as human beings,” he said.
Politics is the root cause of the prison system’s problems, Forsterling said. For example, the 1994 crime bill almost tripled Wisconsin’s prison population. He said that “we the people” need to get decent people elected and restore rehabilitative programs, which have slowly been disappearing, back into the system. The DOC doesn’t let people participate in the programs they must complete until near the end of their sentence, he said, which means they can’t complete them soon enough to be considered for release anywhere close to on time.
Megan Kolb tearfully related her father’s last days before he hanged himself after nine days in solitary confinement. He spent those days begging for his psychiatric meds, which he had not gotten in 71 days. He was given no paper, no pen, no books. “We need rehabilitation, not torture,” she declared.
“Bobby” was paroled three years ago by John Tate II (the crowd applauded this name), 27 years into a 60-year sentence. He spent over seven years in solitary. He went in with PTSD due to the loss of his parents, and while in prison received notice via phone that his brother had died. He got no support beyond the empathetic silence of fellow prisoners when his phone call was announced. “Solitary is torture,” he said. “I survived by will alone.” Bobby is now a state-certified peer-support specialist.
Jessica Jacobs is now the director of FREE, which advocates for incarcerated and previously incarcerated women. Two of FREE’s current campaigns are 1) to get doulas in prisons to assist pregnant women and 2) to end the shackling of pregnant women.
Jessica described additional dehumanizing aspects of prison that she experienced: being known only by a number, or maybe one’s last name; being physically abused and completely at the mercy of the guards; being put in solitary for no reason, perhaps even during the booking process. She said the reasons people are imprisoned — PTSD, trauma, sexual assault, substance abuse — are all signals of poverty, and that’s what we need to deal with. We need to expand programming within and outside the prisons, and to offer trauma therapy, not solitary confinement!
Ron Stief talked about the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT), which started 20 years ago out of concern about U.S.-run prisons in Iraq and of Iraqis, e.g. Guantanamo. Five years in, the campaign began to also address the torture in stateside prisons. There have been some successes, e.g. in Maine, where the head of the Maine Department of Corrections (DOC) rewrote its policies. Rick Raemisch, who moved from heading the Wisconsin DOC to directing its parallel in Colorado, spent a few hours in a solitary-cell replica and ended up eliminating solitary confinement in Colorado prisons.
NRCAT has legislative campaigns in 23 states. Michigan has made some progress. Illinois has passed the Nelson Mandela Act: no more than 10 days in solitary, and no more than 20 hours/day. California has passed the Mandela Act, but the governor has threatened to veto it. That happened in New York, too, so the legislature assembled a veto-proof majority. From written legislation to passage took eight years! In New Jersey, there was a confluence of state legislators, faith communities, and activists. Legislators sat in a solitary cell replica, wrote a bill, and had it signed into law in 2022.
There are lots of people in solitary in city jails, too, Stief said, adding that 60-90% of those in solitary would do fine in the general prison/jail population. We have a fear-based system, he said.
The role of the faith community? Working to end torture is a moral absolute, he said. The fight will be long, but it’s worth it. We need the voices of all of us working together.
Legislators respond
“I never thought I’d be legislating [the right of] ‘seeing the sky,’” Rep. Ryan Clancy (D-Milwaukee) said. “The standard is so incredibly low in Wisconsin.”
What gives him hope, said Rep. Darrin Madison (D-Milwaukee), is that advocacy is breaking through, and other states are passing legislation. “When I see advocacy by people who’ve been transitioning back [from prison], with so much pain and such lack of resources, in a world that tells them they’re worth nothing – it gives me the will to sit in this space, which can be one of the most toxic in the state. I know that it can happen here [too], in a state that has a perverse relationship with incarceration.”
“A lot of folks just don’t know,” he added. “They buy into building more prisons, giving more money to the police … The real solution is safety nets … ‘Know that we have your backs,’” he added, addressing those who are system-impacted.
Rev. Willy Brisco of MICAH gave the closing blessing, starting with a little story about God looking down on our institutions of slavery, prisons, and war and saying, “’That’s not what I meant!’”
“Tell someone what you heard today, and don’t be silent again,” Rev. Brisco admonished everyone. The crowd responded with a firm “Amen!”
WISDOM members delivered informational packets to all legislators’ offices after the event.
What is the “23” Campaign?
Since May 23, 2024, MOSES members have been gathering on the Capitol’s State Street steps once a month at noon on the 23rd to draw attention to the fact that hundreds of people are being subjected to solitary confinement in Wisconsin’s prisons and jails, and to demand that the state put an end to this practice. The 23rd was chosen to draw attention to the fact that people in solitary spend 23+ hours/day alone in their tiny cells. They may spend the other hour someplace else, but still alone.
The United Nations has declared that solitary confinement for more than 15 days is torture. By that measure, we are torturing hundreds of people in Wisconsin’s prisons and jails. Said WISDOM’s David Liners: “Wisconsin needs to join the states that have adopted the ‘Mandela rule’ that limits the practice to 15 days, and that for only in extraordinary circumstances.”
by MOSES Publications | Mar 1, 2025 | Advocacy, Featured, Housing, Information, RJAC Racial Justice for All Children, Schools, Yearbook
Racial Justice for All Children Task Force (RJAC) Had a Busy Year
In 2024, RJAC was active on a number of fronts, including developing new avenues for promoting racial justice for our youth.
Education Advocacy Group (EAG)
This group focused firmly on monitoring the implementation of new early learning literacy requirements as outlined in Wisconsin Act 20, for which RJAC had advocated in 2023. This advocacy took place on a number of fronts. With the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD), the EAG met twice with Gabi Bell, MMSD’s director of Literacy, Bi-literacy, and Humanities. MMSD had begun its pivot to a science-of-reading based literacy curriculum prior to the passage of Act 20. We learned the following:
- MMSD will continue using its current screener, as the Department of Public Instruction has not yet selected a required screener(s) as part of its Act 20 implementation.
- MMSD will create individual reading plans for students with low reading scores by January 2025. The outline of these individual plans will be available to the public soon.
- MMSD is working on support for families and tutors, and Ms. Bell will be connecting us with this team.
The proposed 2024-25 MMSD budget identified literacy as THE district priority and proposed funding 20 additional positions at the K-1 level to support this effort. The EAG facilitated an advocacy campaign with the MMSD Board regarding this proposal. RJAC Co-Chair Shel Gross presented in-person testimony at the June 24 Board of Education meeting, and six MOSES members sent written testimony, including MOSES President Saundra Brown. Saundra also met with new MMSD Superintendent Dr. Joe Gothard and described their meeting as inspiring and hopeful. She will be connecting the task force with Dr. Gothard, who said he appreciates MOSES’s advocacy work.
Early Literacy Curriculum Council (ELCC): Act 20 created the ELCC, which was charged with identifying curricula that meet the requirements of the law. Schools purchasing these curricula would be eligible for state grants to support part of the purchase price. The EAG connected to the ELCC through one of its members, whom we met through a parents’ advocacy group called Decoding Dyslexia. EAG member Judy Fitzgerald was also monitoring the work of the ELCC. The EAG successfully advocated for a shorter list of high quality curricula that the ELCC had identified, rather than the longer list of curricula put forward by the DPI that minimally met Act 20 requirements.
Sun Prairie Area School District (SPASD): Our April meeting featured a presentation by Lisa Goldsberry, Sun Prairie School District Board member (who recently resigned due to other district issues). Lisa spoke about concerns with the cultural content of the new Sun Prairie literacy curriculum; MOSES had sent a letter in March to SPASD leaders and board members regarding these same concerns. Lisa also told us about the changes that she and others had made regarding who should be part of the team addressing these concerns and how that work should be done. SPASD worked with the curriculum’s publisher, but it does not appear that the publisher plans to make any changes. Led by EAG Chair Tracy Frank, we advocated on a number of fronts for consideration of appropriate cultural content – especially as required by other state statutes, such as Act 31 – in selection of curricula eligible for grants.
Department of Public Instruction (DPI): At our November meeting, we welcomed Barb Novak, the head of Wisconsin Reads, which is the DPI office in charge of implementing Act 20. Her presentation put Act 20 in the larger context of the various education requirements that schools need to meet. She discussed Act 31, which requires an instructional program that provides understanding of human relations, particularly with regard to Native Americans, Black Americans, Hispanics, and Hmong and other Asian Americans. This was in response to concerns the EAG had raised about the SPASD curriculum. Barb also discussed the Wisconsin Standards for English Language Arts, which also encourage texts that reflect diverse experiences. Barb also talked about the DPI’s relationship with the ELCC, which she says has improved.
Coalition Building: Members of the EAG have done networking on a variety of fronts: attending the Wisconsin Association of School District Administrators (WASDA) meeting, participating in a literacy event at the Goodman Community Center, participating in the Wisconsin Reading League Conference, and meeting with the director of the Literacy Network.
Looking Ahead: A huge disappointment this year was the state Legislature’s failure to release the funds that were appropriated to defray school districts’ costs for purchasing approved Act 20 curricula and hiring literacy specialists through the DPI to support implementation. The EAG anticipates working with the Legislature on a “trailer bill” to address this failure, as well as the concerns about the curriculum content.
Housing Group
In 2023, the Housing Group (HG), along with other members of RJAC and MOSES, participated in a successful effort to have the state Supreme Court shorten the record retention period for eviction cases in which no money judgment is entered from 20 years to two. The HG monitored implementation of this rule change into 2024, when it was finalized with a modification to address a previously unidentified conflict with another state statute.
Through 2024, the HG continued to discern how best to respond to the wide variety of housing issues currently in play, including the challenges of advocacy for affordable housing in a market that is driving housing costs higher. Given the prominent failures in low-income housing developments that dominated 2023, we seek to stay informed and speak up as people in newer housing developments encounter chaos. The reorganized Education and Advocacy Committee of the Homeless Services Consortium has welcomed MOSES’ partnership in their efforts. In support of these goals, the HG engaged in the following in 2024:
- Met with Diana Shinall, director of the Salvation Army Family Shelter on Milwaukee Street, to learn about the services provided, people served, and regulations. Diana shared considerable information and extended an invitation for the HG members to tour the facilities at a later date.
- Met with Kennedy Elementary School Social Worker Bridget Cremin to discuss the impact of housing insecurity on Kennedy students. Kennedy has the highest number of housing-insecure youth in the district. She highlighted the severe housing situation in the area, including the troubled low-income Harmony, Meadowlands, and Ace apartments housing units; and the Salvation Army Family Shelter, which serves 35 families experiencing homelessness.
- HG members and others in RJAC submitted written and oral testimony to the MMSD Board in support of Kennedy Elementary becoming a Community School as part of the 2024-25 budget. This will allow them to receive more resources to support children and families.
- Learned about implementation of a $2.5-million grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development that was awarded to the Dane County Consortium of Care in partnership with Briarpatch. The program is designed to help communities support homeless youth, typically ranging from ages 12–24. Unlike many other HUD grants, the program requires that youth voices be heavily included throughout the planning and implementation stages.
In her role as Board member of the Homeless Services Consortium, Patti La Cross engaged the HG in the Dane County Homelessness Summit in November, part of “Homeless Awareness November” events. Both Patti and RJAC Chair Shel Gross attended the summit and reported back on potential advocacy options going forward. During the 2023-24 school year, 2,284 students experienced homelessness in Dane County, and it looks like that number will be exceeded in the current school year. Patti noted two connections between homelessness and incarceration: (1) that incarceration of an adult often contributes to their children experiencing homelessness, and (2) that the experience of homelessness, itself, increases the likelihood of criminal-legal system involvement. Increasing rents and other landlord requirements are contributing to this. Services to these families are not readily available in many areas of the county, and lack of transportation to get to services was a recurring theme. Financial literacy is important for our youth, and educating adults on the requirements for obtaining and maintaining housing is also needed. The HG will look at some potential advocacy opportunities arising from this event.
Restorative Justice and Wellness
Under the leadership of Barbie Jackson, RJAC is building on the restorative justice and school wellness work it engaged in during 2023. In January, RJAC collaborated with the Public Safety Task Force to hold a MOSES-wide gathering about school safety. The 39 people who attended shared their thoughts about the following question: What do you feel are the most important factors for creating safety for everyone in our schools, especially our Black students, who are more likely to be responded to in ways which lead them into the school-to-prison pipeline?
Responses fell broadly into five areas: increase youth community engagement; increase the number of teachers, administrators, and support staff with enhanced training; address life stressors such as lack of affordable housing and the behavioral impacts of these; use more informed interventions, e.g., social-emotional learning and nonviolent crisis intervention; and use school resource officers (which had both proponents and opponents). RJAC was unable to come to consensus on how to narrow down these issues. However, we noted that a number of the issues are being supported through the new superintendent’s Wellness Advisory Group. These are items that MMSD is already interested in, and we have a connection to that process through Barbie’s participation in that group. We agreed we would move forward by monitoring that advisory group and identifying key topics of interest for MOSES. A small group has been meeting, with the goal of creating an issue proposal.
As part of the MMSD budget advocacy in June, RJAC members also supported these two items related to restorative justice and wellness:
- Funding the MMSD Restorative Justice (RJ) project manager, whose federal funding lapsed at the end of June, and calling for funding at least one additional school-based RJ coordinator for Capital and Shabazz high schools. These two positions were not in the proposed budget.
- 10.4 additional FTE positions for mental-health support professionals.
Barbie and Shel continued to engage with MMSD RJ program staff and RJ coaches at some of the high schools. They were part of a Community Conversation about Restorative Justice in Our Schools event in April, which was co-sponsored by Freedom Inc. and Families for Justice. Attendees learned how RJ was rolling out in the four comprehensive high schools and had an opportunity to participate in circle practice similar to what is being implemented as part of this program.
RJAC was pleased to welcome MMSD Restorative Justice (RJ) Program Coordinator Kat Nichols and her colleague Lonna Stoltfus to the November general meeting to talk about and demonstrate how RJ is being implemented in the MMSD. There was interest in follow-up activities that we hope to report on moving forward.
Transitions
In 2024, we restructured RJAC’s meeting schedule. Instead of having the task force meeting and the two working group meetings all on different weeks, we combined all meetings into one, using a variety of experimental approaches to keep us actively engaged in each area of focus while increasing our synergies and efficiency in meeting schedules. The working groups alternate taking responsibility for a focus topic for the month in which the entire task force participates. We then have breakout time for each of the task force groups to address their specific issues and concerns. This has reduced the time demand of meetings but still allows us to move forward on our issues.
As they have assumed leadership roles in MOSES, Saundra Brown and Barbie Jackson have reduced their leadership roles in RJAC. Shel Gross transitioned into the task force co-chair and then into the chair role by the end of the year. Tracy Frank is chairing the EAG. We are grateful for the work that Saundra and Barbie did in developing the task force and leading it through its infancy.
by MOSES Publications | Dec 31, 2024 | Information, MOSES leadership, Support MOSES
Congregational/Organizational Members
Call to Action Catholics Madison Area
First Unitarian Society of Madison
First United Methodist Church
Grace Episcopal Church
Holy Wisdom Monastery
James Reeb Unitarian Universalist Congregation
Lake Edge Lutheran Church
Madison Christian Community (Advent Lutheran and Community of Hope United Church of Christ)
Madison Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends
Messiah Lutheran Church
Middleton Community United Church of Christ
Orchard Ridge United Church of Christ
Prairie Unitarian Universalist Society
Prison Ministry Project and The Crossing Campus Ministry
St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church
St. Dunstan’s Episcopal Church
St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church
Second Baptist Church
Snowflower Buddhist Sangha
Southwest Wisconsin Association of the United Church of Christ, Division of Social Concerns
Unity of Madison
Mission partners:
Memorial United Church of Christ
Midvale Community Lutheran Church
Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ
by MOSES Publications | Dec 31, 2024 | Advocacy, Information, MOSES activities, Organizer
Greetings, All,
As 2024 comes to a close, I want to extend my deepest Thanks and Gratitude to everyone who has contributed to MOSES. I recognize you have dedicated your time and energy to making our culture and society a better place for all.
Going into 2025, we will face some challenges, but I want to encourage you to stand firm in your faith and convictions to reinforce our commitment to social, racial, and criminal justice reform.
Our mission, vision, and values statements reflect who we are as a collective body of individuals who, beyond the socio-political environments we inhabit, represent in our diversity a conglomerate of people who understand the human condition.
As we strive to become an even more powerful organization for the powerless and those whose voices often go unnoticed, let us not waiver in our commitment to go forth with courage and determination. Let us continue to honor and respect one another, to support one another when challenges arise; and “Let’s Do MOSES!”
