@fpwa.bsky.social @cmcrystalhudson.bsky.social @goodshepherdnyc.bsky.social

Tomorrow: New York's human services sector support the city - but stagnating wages threaten both affordability and the stability of that critical workforce. Policy, labor, and nonprofit leaders discuss why and how to fix it.

RSVP: www.eventbrite.com/e/connecting...

On top of an angled teal color block, the title of the promoted brief in white: "Centering Participant and Community Voice in Program Design, Implementation & Evaluation. Building Stronger Communities through Strategic Investments." To the right, a photo shows people gathered in a circle with their hands clasped - this photo is also used on the cover of the brief. The CUNY ISLG logo is at the bottom.

“You gotta listen to your community. You gotta get out and find out what’s in their needs. Not what you think their needs are, but what their needs [actually] are.”

Since 2015, CJII has worked to integrate community voices within its approaches. Read how. buff.ly/spy3ktE

Who Cares for New York? Wages, Human Service Workers, and Affordability Policymakers, nonprofit leaders, and researchers examine what it would mean to raise wages for NY's lowest-paid human services workers.

One week away! Policy, labor, and research leaders discuss the wage gap facing the human services sector that New York relies on - and what we can do about it.

Free, in-person, with breakfast provided. Livestream available. RSVP:
www.eventbrite.com/e/who-cares-...

The Justice Training Institute. A new resource hub for alternative-to-incarceration (ATI) and reentry providers in New York City. Topics include: The criminal legal system and its actors; Person-centered case management; Mental illness, substance use, and co-occurring disorders; Trauma-informed care; and Using data regularly, safely, and for impact. Brought to you by CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance and the NYC Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice.

The Justice Training Institute is live. Criminal justice service providers in NYC now have a one-stop-shop to find trainings, request tailored support, and build knowledge around the legal system, behavioral health issues, and organizational management. islg.cuny.edu/blog/launchi...

Study finds many New York human service workers earn poverty-level wages A recent study shows that home health care workers and others who work in human service fields are among some of the poorest state workers.

Stagnating wages for the human service workers affect those providing the most critical types of care: supporting the elderly, watching kids, working with those who have disabilities. @spectrumnewsny1.bsky.social highlights our data on the gap, and spoke to people it's affecting.

Request for Proposals: Project Restore Flatbush. CUNY ISLG and the Kings County District Attorney’s Office are seeking a Flatbush, Brooklyn-serving community organization to launch Project Restore, an innovative, community-centered initiative to reduce gang-related and retaliatory violence, improve community safety, and support young people ages 15-28 most at risk of involvement in gun violence. Applications are due May 22. See the full RFP on CUNY ISLG’s site.

Attn, Flatbush-serving community organizations: bring Project Restore to the neighborhood.

@brooklynda.org & CUNY ISLG are seeking a partner to reduce gang-related and retaliatory violence, improve community safety & support the positive development of young people.

Learn more: buff.ly/YZHfZ6p

RECAP: Building a Legacy of Research for Action — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) The 2026 Safety and Justice Challenge Research Symposium was an opportunity to reflect on the meaningful efforts and results of participating cities and counties, and dug into the expansive knowledge…

How do you reflect on 10 years of data, from 50+ cities & counties, that resulted in 18k less people held in jail without impacting safety?

The Safety + Justice Challenge Research Symposium did just that. On our blog, we recapped what worked, what didn’t, and what should come next. buff.ly/oJfAJIv

Who Cares for New York? Wages, Human Service Workers, and the Affordability Policymakers, nonprofit leaders, and researchers examine what it would mean to raise wages for NY's lowest-paid human services workers.

Join in person in Midtown on 4/22, with breakfast starting at 9 am: buff.ly/Ki1mKYh
Join us via livestream: buff.ly/lO9OZBz

A blue graphic, overlaid on a picture of children playing in a childcare center. White text reads: "Who Cares for New York? Wages, Human Service workers, and the Affordability Crisis. April 22, 10-11:30 am, ET, in person and livestreamed. Policymakers, nonprofit leaders, and researchers come together to examine what it would take--and what it would mean--to raise wages for New york's lowest-paid human services workers: the tradeoffs, the mechanisms, and the path forward." At the bottom, four headshots, showing Jennifer Jones Austin, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director of FPWA; Melanie Hartzog, President & CEO of NY Foundling; Henry Garrido, Executive Director of DC37; and Cecilia Low-Weiner, Senior Research Associate, CUNY ISLG. Others to be announced.

RSVP: Join the conversation on why and how to raise wages to New York's human services sector. Leading policy and labor leaders discuss the data and real-life implications of New York's stagnating wages for state and local government-funded human service workers.

Introducing the Justice Training Institute. A new resource hub for alternative-to-incarceration (ATI) and reentry providers in New York City. This includes: Tools for better understanding the criminal legal system, behavioral health issues, and organizational management, a calendar of upcoming training and events, and On-demand, organization-tailored training. Brought to you by CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance and the NYC Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice.

Criminal justice service providers in NYC have a new toolbox.

The NYC Justice Training Institute, from us and the NYC Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice, offers a calendar of trainings, on-demand assistance, and other resources to upskill staff and strengthen services. buff.ly/9caMZFl

“I serve as a focal point.” Q&A with NYS Assembly Chief of Staff Jacob Sherretts — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) “I serve as a focal point, because everybody else on the team is specializing. The chief of staff is the one that needs to bring that all together and make sure it's heading in the right direction..”

“Nobody gives you a handbook and says, ‘this is how you should be chief of staff for this office.’ Each district has different needs and different personalities.”

Our Q&A with NYS Assembly Chief of Staff Jacob Sherretts, representing parts of Syracuse, is up now.
buff.ly/1aU3s92

WATCH: Strategies for a New Era of Policing and Public Safety in NYC — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) In March 2026, ISLG partnered with the CUNY Graduate Center to convene leading researchers and practitioners to discuss how the police can us everyday interactions to strengthen trust and enhance publ...

Missed the panel? We wrote a recap - read it and watch the full discussion on our blog. islg.cuny.edu/blog/strateg...

Stop and frisk. Housing. Substance use. Justice. Earlier this month at @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social, we convened national experts on policing to discuss new strategies for safety and trust in NYC and beyond.

Tracking Real-Life Cases, Data Shows Reforms Reduced Jail Populations without Spiking Crime — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) Studying real, case-level data from cities and counties reducing their jail populations has led researchers to a conclusion: pretrial reforms made through the Safety and Justice Challenge did not…

New data from 10 years of tracking people released pretrial across 12+ #SafetyandJusticeChallenge cities & counties: the majority of people released pretrial were not rebooked for any crime. Locally responsive reforms work. More on our blog, in collaboration with @innovatingjustice.bsky.social.

We're hosting the Safety + Justice Challenge's final Research Symposium! Check out a great thread of the policy, data, and insights we're diving into.👇

In the South Bronx, CUNY Student Fellows Bring the Civic Conversation to Communities  — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) Each Fellow—and the CBOs in which they are embedded—works on meaningful initiatives designed to foster voter education and engagement. But each Fellow’s work looks different day-to-day or overall.…

The South Bronx is a multifaceted collection of communities. The orgs that serve it have a wide range of services to match.

The @CUNY.edu Civic Engagement Fellows are working with many of them to bring their voices to the civic conversation - and the voting booth. buff.ly/99gPmgt

buff.ly/xIrqPvp

The Fiscal Flow between New York City and Albany — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) This report estimates the “fiscal flow” between the city and state using data from the New York State Fiscal Year 2021-2022 and Census data to estimate taxpayers’ “place of work” as well as “place of…

What is the "fiscal flow" between New York State and its economic center? Our new analysis sheds light.

Building our joint study released this winter, this week we released an update with preliminary numbers looking at what NYC contributed and received from Albany in 2025. buff.ly/UM0Ebsy

Tonight! Join us for what promises to be a great conversation on how to foster trust, safety, and respect in interactions between police and the public.

RSVP to join us in-person at the @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social or via livestream: www.gc.cuny.edu/events/strat...

Institute Intelligence, February 2026: The Pace of Justice, Q&A with a Syracuse Chief of Staff — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) A snapshot of the work we’ve done this past month.

A conversation with a NYS Assembly Chief of Staff from Syracuse. A dive into why case processing times are lengthening. Recaps of our staff's on-air interviews and lectures.

That, and more, in February's Institute Intelligence. Read on🗞️: buff.ly/26jPjvv

Against a blue background, title text reads: "Strategies for a New Era of Policing & Public Safety in NYC." Underneath, a collage of headshots of the moderator and panelists. Event description: "Join leading experts as they examine what cutting-edge research suggests about improving public safety through police-community interactions." Logistical info: "Wednesday, March 4, 2026 @ 6:30 pm. Virtually or IRL at the CUNY Graduate Center in Midtown NYC."

Next week: How can we rethink how police interact with the public in NYC? Experts come together at @thegraduatecenter.bsky.social to dive into research-based strategies for police-community interactions, crisis response, and procedural justice. RSVP to join us in-person or online. bit.ly/4q4mrmF

How Do You Solve a Problem Like Rikers? We Asked 4 Experts for Their Ideas As remediation manager Nicholas Deml and commissioner Stanley Richards take over, veterans of NYC's troubled jail system discuss the biggest challenges they face and ways to solve them.

The incoming folks looking to change the course at Rikers and NYC's jails have a big job. A big concern? The length of time people stay in jail.

As our Michael Jacobson told @thecity.nyc, that some people spend up to 3 years in jails is unconstitutional and leads to jail violence.

The Waiting Game: How Lengthy Court Case Processing Times Keep Jail Populations High — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) The timely resolution of court cases is a responsibility of the court system. But many criminal courts struggle to resolve cases in reasonable timeframes, with case processing times increasing even…

Court case delays aren’t just bureaucratic; they’re shaped by political decisions and limited oversight.

Our latest blog explores case processing data from the Safety and Justice Challenge and highlights the importance of data transparency & shared accountability. Dig in: buff.ly/BlPrnTq

Jersey City Faces a Stunning Budget Deficit, Report Shows The city’s new mayor, James Solomon, is blaming his predecessor, Steven Fulop, who just became the head of an influential business advocacy group in New York City.

Jersey City is tackling a major budget crisis. CUNY ISLG is on the ground floor to help the new mayoral administration across the Hudson diagnose why it happened and chart a new path toward fiscal health.

Between 2016-2024, court filings and dispositions in many cities and counties went down, dropping quickly during the pandemic. But the time it takes to process these cases is rising.

Learn why in our brief: buff.ly/n41KrsY

While Gone from the Headlines, New York Still Needs to Address Discovery Reform — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) Amid mixed results to date, policymakers can insist on better implementation of New York’s discovery reform, provide prosecutors with whatever tools they need, and steadfastly avoid sacrificing the…

Last year, discovery reform & its effect on crime dominated the news. What resulted was a band aid, ISLG researchers wrote in a joint op-ed with Data Collaborative for Justice.

Read more about what isn't working and how policymakers, court stakeholders, and researchers can fix it: buff.ly/HlHzquZ

The Pace of Processing Justice — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) We use cookies to provide you with a great experience and to help our website run effectively. By using this website, you agree to our use of cookies. See our Privacy Policy for more information.

Lengthy court case delays can upend lives, even for people held in jail pretrial briefly. Our new analysis of Safety and Justice Challenge data on case processing shows that even as case volumes fell, processing times rose nationwide.

Explore the data: islg.cuny.edu/pace-case-pr...

Former DOC commissioner weighs in on Mamdani’s appointment Watch the full interview here.

Mayor Mamdani named @thefortunesociety.bsky.social's Stanley Richards as commissioner of NYC Dept of Corrections, as the city's jails face inflection points.

📺️ Our Michael Jacobson joined @spectrumnewsny1.bsky.social to discuss Richard's commitment to a "dignified, human system".

Institute Intelligence, January 2026: Revisiting Discovery Reform, Local Data Answers Crime Questions — CUNY Institute for State & Local Governance (ISLG) A snapshot of the work we’ve done this past month.

Our first Institute Intelligence of the year is here. 📩

We're closing out the first month of 2026 with new research, collaborations, and insights shaping policy and practice in NYC and beyond.

Read more: buff.ly/Vr1CYxC

In the Bronx, the Kingsbridge Armory is being redeveloped with local organizations set to own a major proportion and shape what gets built, setting a precedent for what equitable development can look like. @NextCityOrg dives into the progress so far: buff.ly/XuwjYWD