Mackenzie Fallt, MA

🚨 New 50-State Comparison alert!!! 🚨 An old favorite haha. Here's the newest version of our 50-SC on Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems that Claus and I put together! This one has some additional insights on research agendas guiding data systems, staffing, governance, and more. Check it out!

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A new report produced by the Center for New York City Affairs in partnership with the Institute on Race, Power, and Political Economy at The New School and the Center for Community Uplift The Brookings Institution reveals racial and economic inequities in New York City’s public transportation subsidies. Examining subsidies across the city’s ten transit systems by race and income, the report finds inequities between subsidies for the NYC Ferry service compared with the Fair Fares program for the MTC’s subway and bus riders, and underscores the importance of assessing policies and budgets through a #racialequity lens. Read the report: https://lnkd.in/ekE6Y-R9 #FairFares #TransitEquity #NYCSubsidies #EconomicMobility #TransportationEquity

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The latest report from Center for Democracy & Technology (authored by Maddy Dwyer!) sheds light on how data and technology can help child welfare agencies overcome these challenges while acknowledging the inherent risks. CDT offers key recommendations: 1. Identify the problems data or technology can solve and potential harms. 2. Engage affected stakeholders, from caseworkers to foster youth. 3. Establish or enhance data and technology governance for decision-making. 4. Implement and manage AI tools safely and responsibly. 5. Diligently vet third-party vendors. As public agencies increasingly adopt AI-powered tools, these guidelines are crucial for maximizing benefits and mitigating harms. By following these recommendations, we can better support our foster care system, ensuring that every child receives the care and opportunities they deserve. https://lnkd.in/erexfRhj #ChildWelfare #FosterCare #Data #Technology #AI #Governance #CDT #SocialWork #PublicService #Innovation #ResponsibleAI

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Our work on the Equity in Civic Technology team at the Center for Democracy & Technology focuses on ensuring public agencies are using data and technology -- like #ArtificialIntelligence -- in ways that safeguard the civil rights and civil liberties of all populations, but especially the most vulnerable. As Foster Care Awareness Month came to a close in May, I published a report highlighting the ways that data and technology can alleviate some of the problems that child welfare agencies face in working with #FosterYouth and homes, while also mitigating their inherent risks. Across the U.S., state and local child welfare agencies serve over 390,000 youth in foster care – a particularly vulnerable population that experiences unique health, educational, and wellbeing issues. Child welfare agencies are tasked with the high-stakes responsibility of ensuring the safety of these youth in their care, but encounter many challenges, such as: * Lack of coordination across agencies that work with foster youth * Insufficient or biased data about a child’s original home environment * Heavy administrative burdens that contribute to high rates of social worker turnover Our report provides recommendations to child welfare agencies who are using, or considering, data and technology systems to alleviate these challenges, while protecting the best interest of foster youth. Some of the recommendations included in the report are: * Identifying the problems that data or technology may solve, and the potential harms it could introduce, * Engaging affected stakeholders, from caseworkers to foster youth, * Establishing and/or enhancing inter- and intra-agency data and technology governance to guide decision making, * Implementing and managing AI tools safely and responsibly, and; * Being diligent in vetting third party vendors. Data and technology hold promise in assisting child welfare agencies to efficiently and equitably carry out the functions needed to support foster youth and homes. However, decisions around procurement and implementation of new systems must center around protecting the #CivilRights and #CivilLiberties of youth in foster care. Thank you to my brilliant colleagues and the external foster care experts who collaborated with me on this project!

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✔ 📰 I just published a Baker Institute commentary briefly highlighting some of the finding from a recent collaborative paper with Wake Forest ethicists Zubin Master on state laws marketing unproven stem cell treatments. Check out commentary (link below) or the original paper (https://lnkd.in/ge-9X8yx).

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#ICYMI see our survey on political engagement & political violence. Our findings show voters: ➡️ Are divided on the 2020 election. ➡️ Support proposals to ensure elections are fair, secure & conducted speedily. ➡️ Oppose political violence. https://bit.ly/3WfVwYr

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The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC) held a hearing last week titled “Restoring Congressional Oversight Over Emergency Powers; Exploring Options to Reform the National Emergencies Act.” AFP Foundation sent a letter to the Committee describing the problematic implications of the president’s effectively unlimited executive powers under the National Emergencies Act (NEA). A national emergency declaration under the NEA gives the president potential access to an estimated 148 statutory powers. https://lnkd.in/ewaPjw3Q AFP Foundation’s letter states, “The NEA did not go far enough to constrain presidential authority and, as a result, emergency declarations—and the expanded statutory powers they unlock—can persist for decades. This system is ripe for abuse and presidents have proven reluctant to let go of authority on their own.” The president’s emergency powers are meant to be special tools locked in a glass case. We can see they are there if needed, but they should only be brought out under extraordinary circumstances. The glass has been broken for some time, and presidents from both parties are using these powers like a Swiss army knife to impose their policy preferences and address persisting issues they perceive as problematic. Congress has an opportunity to replace the glass, put the powers back in the case, and restore constitutional order to the government. 

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Curious about the work of the National Civic League's Center for Democracy Innovation? We've got you! Learn how The Center is making democracy more participatory, equitable, and productive: https://ow.ly/2QCC50RyAje

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The Spring 2024 volume of the National Civic Review is out. Check out some interesting articles about hope and democracy, a novel idea of participatory assembly budgeting, municipal proportional representation, and more!!! If you'd like to contribute to the NCR, please feel free to reach out.

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Does the state have a role in moving us away from extractive racial capitalism and toward an abolitionist future? Andrea Ritchie and Mariame Kaba's response for the Boston Review’s “Climate, State, and Utopia” forum. "The immediate task, then, is assessing what work needs to be done to create the conditions for something new to emerge. This requires that we grapple with practical questions, such as how to organize at the community level at a scale necessary to meet collective needs in a global society in ways that do not replicate the policing functions of the state. What liberatory mechanisms of individual and mutual accountability can we imagine and practice within these projects? How might we preserve collective resources for the common good against those who would seek to accumulate them for private gain or put personal preference above collective goals? How do we navigate strategic questions focused on limiting the state’s power to do harm and maximizing its capacity to meet collective needs while practicing and fighting for more participatory forms of governance?"

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Caregiving demands are increasingly impacting our current and future workforce. I am happy to have contributed to Bipartisan Policy Center Action's recent survey of over 4,000 registered voters, conducted in partnership with Pivotal Ventures and Morning Consult, to assess the broad impact of caregiving on voters. When over half of caregivers report that caregiving responsibilities—such as caring for a child, a parent or older relative, or a disabled family member—have affected their careers, and 8 in 10 voters agree that it is important for candidates and policymakers to increase investments to make it easier for Americans to care for their loved ones, it is clear that Congress needs to take action. Read more about the broad impact of caregiving among registered voters here: https://lnkd.in/g92Tddww #PaidFamilyLeave #Workforce #PaidLeaveForAll #FamilyPolicy

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We need to fundamentally shift the conversation around progress and national strength. To me, progress is made by those who infuse public institutions with our values, not by those who seek to undermine or abandon our institutions, particularly during a time when the forces of illiberalism are attacking the foundations of liberal government. In building the Frontier Mission Network, we have asked for engagement from Chicago researchers, entrepreneurs, and capital investors who may have objections to American policies. (I had my own concerns about American policies as a 22-year-old enlisted soldier in Iraq!) We aim to serve the American military not because we are asking anyone to set aside their views, but to instead recognize that we serve American progress with our values and strength. Put another way: If the United States cannot or refuses to lead, others will step into the void, and you can assume those who step into the void would be even less welcome at SXSW. https://lnkd.in/ghV8wprD

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B-Luke interviewed Kentel Weaver, Swinks Laporte, and Kevin Keo on his Bounce Back Podcast recently. At the beginning of the interview, Kentel states, "We are infiltrating all of these little spaces that they said we wasn't worthy of, all these little spaces that they felt we didn't belong in, so we are trying to change all of that. That's my end game." It made me think of a passage that my loved one, Kwame, read to me once from "The Undercommons: Fugitive Planning & Black Study:" "'To the university I'll steal, and there I'll steal," to borrow from Pistol at the end of Henry V, as he would surely borrow from us. This is the only possible relationship to the American university today. This may be true of universities everywhere. It may have to be true of the university in general. But certainly, this much is true in the United States: it cannot be denied that the university is a place of refuge, and it cannot be accepted that the university is a place of enlightenment. In the face of these conditions one can only sneak into the university and steal what one can. To abuse its hospitality, to spite its mission, to join its refugee colony, its gypsy encampment, to be in but not of - this is the path of the subversive intellectual in the modern university." As I reflect on these important words from Stefano Harney and Fred Moten, I think of what it means to build safety for one another inside the university. How do I as an academic find ways to create safety for myself and others? Kentel, Swinks, and Kevin teach us important lessons in this interview about communities of care. These lessons can be extended to all of us who are fighting the same structures of violence as we hold our universities accountable for their complicity in the genocide in Gaza. Towards the end of the book, the authors state, "...not abolition as the elimination of anything but as the founding of new society." It is the very people in this interview that will lead us into that new society -- I will happily follow them. Listen to the interview asap: https://lnkd.in/gBzhXdXP

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The National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) has released two new resources to support communities and local leaders with heat planning and evaluation efforts: the Introduction to Heat Tabletop Planning and Coordination describes the steps and timeline necessary for communities to develop and run a heat tabletop exercise; the Maturity Model for Heat Governance presents a framework that leaders and decision-makers can use to assess their capacity to successfully manage heat risk across 10 unique dimensions. Visit Heat.gov to download the resources!

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Check out this new research from my Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism colleague Beth Daviess!

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The field of documentary impact has evolved over the last two decades. In a blog for Narrative Initiative, Sonya Crespo Childress reflects on that evolution and how the ecosystem of POC organizations can contribute to grassroots narrative change and impact. https://lnkd.in/eHJtTAN5

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To imagine and create a world rooted in values of economic justice and economic democracy, we need to devise a new vocabulary. Check out NPQ’s Economic Justice Glossary: https://bit.ly/4dF2IoC

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