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"When people ask me for a book recommendation - just one book - this is the one I recommend. Until We Reckon (by Danielle Sered) has been such an incredible resource."
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Tiffany Cabán"We should be talking about why we don’t have safe staffing in our hospitals, why we don’t have more resources, why we aren’t creating environments that allow people to access care. Rather than saying “Hey, we’re going to criminalize you and throw you into the criminal justice system.”"
Tiffany Cabán is an American attorney, politician, and political organizer who has served as a member of the New York City Council for the 22nd District since the 2021 New York City Council election. She won the Democratic primary for the seat after the incumbent, Democrat Costa Constantinides, retired.
"When people ask me for a book recommendation - just one book - this is the one I recommend. Until We Reckon (by Danielle Sered) has been such an incredible resource."
"Every day in court was just a constant reminder that our justice system is the single most powerful driver of the continued oppression of our black and brown, our low-income, our immigrant, our LGBTQIA+ communities. But one thing that’s also glaringly obvious is that if you have money, if you have the right political ties, if you pad the right pockets, you can get away with doing a lot of harm in our communities."
"I think that we’re in this really special moment in time where we’re seeing decarceral prosecutors, committed to keeping people rooted in their communities with access to resources and supports, be elected all around the country. We’re seeing defense attorneys being elected into these positions all around the country, and also being able to navigate relationships with police departments that, you know, coming in, were sort of adversarial, just based on the things that they were talking about."
"We could be partnering and working on LEAD initiatives, Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion, things that we’re seeing in Seattle, up in Albany, that are working, that give police officers the opportunity to make the decision not to make an arrest and just to provide support. And in places where they’re doing these things, they’re seeing violence between officers and civilians go down exponentially."
"When you’re on the ground in court every day, you recognize that some of these programs and the way that they are put into place do more to destabilize rather than stabilize and heal. And so, being able to kind of pinpoint those things and say sometimes it’s even better just to have people out of the system, period, so that we’re not criminalizing poverty, mental health, substance use, or criminalizing already marginalized communities, like our queer communities of color."
"You cannot separate our criminal justice from housing, health care, and education. You just can’t."