Acknowledgements
Developing this report has been a massive undertaking, spanning over a year of research and thousands of volunteer hours. An acknowledgment in here is but a small token of our gratitude to everyone who made this report possible, not only investing their time, resources, and faith in a new report in a little-understood subject area, but who invested their time, their resources, and their faith in a new organization to make it happen.
Firstly, thank you to ICS’s small but dedicated donor base who invested in this project despite far fewer updates from me than you likely needed. A special thank you to our board members, Tim Clarke, Cassaundra Fryman, Jeff Lewis, Robert Perry, and Rick Rivkin, who not only invested in this project but then gave of their time to ensure it was able to be completed.
Secondly, thank you to our research team, including ICS Research Director Isaac Lindenberger, and research assistants Daniel Blois and Sonya Zuniga, for working hundreds of long, sometimes thankless hours putting the pieces together that eventually became this research paper. Your persistence in continuing even as the research met dead-end after dead-end is the reason this report is published today.
Thirdly, thank you to the ICS advisory board, Johnny Davis, JD, LLM, our criminal justice advisor, Prof. James W. Payne, who first suggested the use of case studies for this report, and Prof. Joseph Fioramonti, who has a gift for understanding how to create a report that won’t just sit on a shelf.
To the dozens of nonprofit staff and volunteers who dug in old filing cabinets, put together spreadsheets, and dedicated extra hours to pass our strict evaluations and be a part of this project, it would have been impossible to do without you and you and your organizations are why this report can help community leaders achieve justice for their communities. Thank you to Jody Suhrbier, Nicholas Schmitt, Jessica Goldberg, Dana Henderson, Longmont Police Commander James Brown, Catherine Gunderson, Erin Goudreau, Probation Officer Nick Nyman, Xiani Williams, Ed Cue, D.G. Mawn and all your overworked staff for the effort you put into this project.
Finally, for the final phase of this project, thank you to the academics, researchers, and practitioners who reviewed this report before its release. Thank you to Dr. Jeffrey Butts, Dr. Kathleen Daly, Dr. Mark Umbreit, attorneys Cory Stufflebeem and Lorenn Walker, and Representative Lorig Charkoudian. Your review has helped put the final touches on this project.
Executive Director, Institute for Community Solutions