September 2019 CPL Newsletter - California Policy Lab

Welcoming new faces at CPL

Over the past few months, CPL has welcomed a number of new talented staff members and faculty affiliates. Among others, we are excited to be joined by Johanna Lacoe, our new Research Director at CPL-Berkeley. Dr. Lacoe comes to us from Mathematica Policy Research and is an expert in criminal and juvenile justice and education policy. We also recruited Pam Seidenman as our new Director of Development, and three new research staff at UCLA, Maya Buenaventura, Dean Obermark, and TJ Hedin. We’re thrilled to hire such great talent.

1 in 8 Californians with a criminal record are eligible for full clearance

Our latest Data Point finds that a new California law (AB 1076), in its original form, would have automatically cleared the full criminal records of over 1.8 million Californians. More than 80% of Californians with a criminal record would have been eligible for some sort of automated clearance, and one in eight would have had their full record cleared. The bill is proceeding through the legislative process, but in a revised form that applies only to future criminal records.

CA funds cradle-to-career data system

California’s new budget includes funds to develop a statewide “Cradle to Career” data system that links together education, health, and human services data to track outcomes and improve operations. This brief, co-authored by CPL Executive Director Evan White, reports on a session of the February Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) conference that brought together experts to discuss the essential questions California must consider as it develops this new coordinated data system.

Opportunities that might be of interest: