Latest news with #419
Yahoo
02-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Advocating for workforce education in prisons to curb repeat offenses
Mar. 2—SANTA FE — Piercing blue eyes set apart by dark-inked tattoos covering much of his head and arms, Isaac Sork took in the small Goodwill office space he sat in, complete with a computer and a few rolling chairs. It was a stark contrast to the prison cell he was confined to just days before, and representative of his transformation back into society and the workforce. "Five days ago, I was locked up," Sork said. "I was told when I could use the restroom ... told when to get up, when to go to sleep. For me to be out now, I feel liberated. I'm independent. "And then I have these two standing behind me. I thank God for these two guys." The two with him, Fernando Ruiz and Ralph Martinez, played crucial roles in ensuring Sork had a job lined up upon his release. Both also know what it's like to leave prison systems feeling unsupported and lost, often leading to a cycle of repeat offenses. Last year, nearly 40% of all inmates released from prison ended up back in the system. It's in part why Ruiz and Martinez started the Entrepreneurial Institute of Northern New Mexico, or EINNM, a nonprofit that aims to smoothen out the transition from behind bars to release. Ruiz, Martinez and Sork are all also spending time at the Roundhouse during this year's 60-day session to advocate for such re-entry programs. Launched in April, EINNM in collaboration with other advocacy groups held its first program with dozens of at-risk youth and individuals at the Kitchen Table Santa Fe, a community kitchen that supports entrepreneurs. As the program was wrapping up, the New Mexico Corrections Department called asking EINNM to host programs for inmates. After securing some state dollars to teach the hands-on work, EINNM had its first prison class in August, which Sork participated in. Another cohort that started in January is wrapping up now, and the next iteration will start in March. EINNM committed to three cohorts a year in the prisons. The eight-week program, accepting a little more than a dozen inmates with 10 months or less to the door, teaches professional and culinary skills. Martinez said there's a waiting list of more than 100 inmates wanting to take the program. "We come from the same place," Martinez said. "We know the realities, which makes the connection a lot stronger." Multiple bills are trying to pass the Legislature that would support correctional workforce reentry development programs. Senate Bills 350 and 351, with mirror bills House Bills 419 and 420, respectively, together seek nearly $20 million to support workforce reentry programs and transitional housing needs. From the pot, $13.5 million would be set aside for the North Central New Mexico Economic Development District to administer and expand a correctional workforce reentry program. The other $6 million would go to the state's Health Care Authority for former inmates' transitional housing needs. The money hasn't made it into the annual budget yet, though bill sponsor Sen. Leo Jaramillo, D-Española, told the Journal he's hopeful it will. A Senate committee is still reviewing the appropriations bill. The workforce reentry bill, HB419, passed one of its two House committee assignments last week, and the two Senate bills — including the mirrored workforce reentry measure — will likely be heard this week. There are just under three weeks for the measures to make it through before the Legislature wraps up on March 22. However, by introducing mirror bills in both chambers, legislators could be quicker to pass the measures since both sides will have already heard about them. "This is just the beginning, we hope," said Nina Chavez, director of government relations for Goodwill Industries of New Mexico, which has a workforce reentry program of its own. From behind bars to behind the grill Ruiz grew up in Arizona and Mexico, with close family cartel connections from a young age. He picked up drug and stolen gun charges at 15 years old, bouncing in and out of the system years after. During one prison stint, Ruiz got his GED and upon release, graduated from culinary school. He settled down in New Mexico 24 years ago and started fielding offers to compete on national culinary shows — "Guy's Grocery Games," "Chopped," "The Great Food Truck Race." Most recently, he won "Beat Bobby Flay." Ruiz didn't want to participate in most of the shows, not wanting the national television fame, but his wife convinced him to. "After that, my life turned upside down," Ruiz said, swiping on his phone from his mugshot to his thousands of unread text messages. He opened a restaurant of his own in August, Escondido, in Santa Fe. Amid all the culinary world fame, Ruiz and Martinez met in 2019. The duo quickly started hosting community events largely focused on helping formerly incarcerated people succeed in life. "We've raised probably over $3 million for different resources over the course of the past four or five years, me and Chef," Martinez said. "And it's just because we share in that same background and we know what it's like." Hope isn't as apparent for Chris, a maximum security inmate at the Penitentiary of New Mexico whose full name officials declined to release due to crime and victim protection concerns. He's serving a life sentence and entered the justice system when he was a teenager. He's been behind bars for 26 years now. Then came Cody — a shepherd-mix dog in need of training and adoption. Española Humane in 2022 launched a different kind of workforce reentry program, pairing inmates with dogs that could use some training for eight weeks to help with their adoption chances out in the public. Chris has been participating in the program for about a decade now. Watching over his most recent pup, Leeloo, Chris naturally guided her leash around when she tried to jump up to give some of the people surrounding her a kiss, also showing off her skills to sit on command and even wave with her paw. "Before I found this, I just kind of existed. I wasn't sure how to get by. I was young," he said. "Then I found this, and I found something to change my situation — something to look forward to, something I'm good at, something I'm proud of." The dogs aren't the only ones learning. The program also teaches inmates responsibility and communication skills, leaving the dogs in their care 24/7 and requiring daily training of the pups. While in the corrections system, Chris is taking a class to become a certified behavioral dog trainer. He said now that he has a life skill that he can get paid good money for, he hopes to pursue a career in the industry if ever granted parole. "If you don't give us skills, what are we going to do? We want us to stay out of prison. Give us some way to do that," he said. 'Another chance' Sork grew up in what he described as a broken home, out on the streets by age 16. He dropped out of high school, losing out on a football scholarship he had, and ended up getting involved with a gang. He picked up gun charges in Texas with a seven-year sentence, which was discharged. Six months after he was released, Sork had another gun charge in New Mexico and five-and-a-half years to serve. "I had lost my wife. I had lost my kids," he said, recounting anger over the sentence. "Family members had died." Upon getting out, he knew he'd battle with stigmas — people looking at his tattoos and assuming he's off or different, when really "I'm a goodhearted individual." Sork wanted to battle the stereotypes, coming out of prison with resources to prepare him for life. When he saw the flyer for a culinary class hosted by EINNM, Sork was excited to signed up. He said he always liked cooking. It's not only culinary skills taught in the class; it's also life skills. On his first day, Sork had to write down five important things to him to remember when he would get out. "I told myself this time, this five and a half years, I reevaluated the way I am," he recalled. "And I'm getting older, so now that I'm getting closer to 40, I have to figure out how to use resources and be independent because, at the end of the day, I want to be a productive part of society." It was a similar sentiment for Daniel Jojola, a current inmate at the Penitentiary of New Mexico who's served multiple stints. He said he's been away from his young kids for the year-and-a-half he's served, and he doesn't want to miss them growing up. It's part of the reason Jojola signed up for an HVAC class offered at the prison, and he hopes to pick up residential work when he's released. He said he has no other choice but to get a good-paying job when he gets out, which is less than a year away. "The sky is the limit. All we need is another chance," Jojola said. On Feb. 14, authorities released Sork, and he began working at Ruiz's Escondido Santa Fe a week later. Among the five important things Sork wrote down on his first day of EINNM's culinary class? Having a place to stay, employment, food and clothes, and a networking system. He's achieved every item on that list since getting out.
Yahoo
01-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Lawmakers try again to hire auditor to oversee Maine's secretive state police intelligence unit
Feb. 28—Some Maine lawmakers are renewing efforts to tap into what's happening inside the state's secretive — and controversial — police intelligence unit. The Maine Information and Analysis Center, also called the MIAC, has been the subject of controversy since 2020 when a whistleblower complaint said the center was illegally monitoring and storing data on civilians. A subsequent document leak also revealed that it had disseminated what some called shoddy intelligence that infringed on people's civil rights. Ever since, lawmakers have been trying to either close the center entirely, or hire an independent auditor to oversee its work. The bill, LD 419, would create an auditing position within the Maine Office of the Attorney General to oversee accountability and transparency of the center, as well as accept questions and complaints. Lawmakers from the Legislature's Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee heard mixed testimony at a public hearing Wednesday, with some saying the agency already provides regular reports. "I think the exact asks of this bill are the exact things that we're doing today," MIAC's director Lt. Mathew Casavant said in a phone interview Thursday. "We've taken every one of those steps to do everything that's outlined in the bill presently. If an auditor would allow for some increased transparency, there's no issue on our end." The proposal was resurrected from last year — it had passed in both chambers but died at the end of the session without funding. Supporters say the bill provides clearer, more proactive guidance for the new role and may contribute to increased transparency. Its sponsor, Rep. Grayson Lookner, D-Portland, told the committee Wednesday that the auditor would ensure that the agency follows its privacy policies and respects all Mainers. "This lack of transparency is a direct threat to civil liberties and undermines the trust between Mainers and their government," Lookner said. "The MIAC was created to protect us, not to spy on us. Its current practices are a betrayal of its original mission and a violation of the public trust." HISTORY OF CONTROVERSY The MIAC is run by the Maine State Police and the Maine Emergency Management Agency, and is one of 80 "fusion centers" in the United States that were created after the 9/11 terrorist attacks to prevent future threats by storing and sharing information — though many centers have focused more on domestic crimes. In 2020, Maine's fusion center came under fire after George Loder, a state trooper in Scarborough, said he was demoted after reporting illegal information collection practices such as storing personal identifying information on people who did not commit a crime. (He was awarded $300,000 in compensatory damages by a federal jury in 2022.) Later that year, data from the unit was made public after a nationwide hack of police intelligence showed the center had collected information on racial-justice protestors and others exercising their First Amendment rights. The center has been under increased scrutiny since then by lawmakers, who passed legislation in 2021 requiring the center to produce annual reports — which they have also criticized for not being detailed enough. Brendan McQuade, an assistant professor of criminology at the University of Southern Maine who studies fusion centers, testified in favor of the bill because he said it would be a good first step in establishing better oversight of the center. McQuade has also analyzed the MIAC with his law students and published a "shadow" report on the same day the center released its annual report in 2022. His version called out a flawed audit process and intelligence reports that violate privacy policies. "For me, this is a disparaging reminder of the effects of mass incarceration," McQuade said in a phone interview Thursday. "Things like mental illness, substance abuse, those are problems of security. Those are problems of the cops and courts. And that's a really clumsy tool to deal with those problems." RAISING THE STANDARD? But critics say hiring an auditor is unnecessary because it is essentially the same position as the center's privacy officer — who is also staffed within the attorney general's office and coordinates the regular audits and annual reports with an advisory board. York County Sheriff Bill King, who spoke against the proposal on behalf of the Maine Sheriffs Association, said he hasn't seen any privacy violations from a "boots on the ground" perspective, and worries the bill would be duplicative of the privacy officer's current role. If the bill were to pass, Casavant said, it may eliminate the need for the privacy officer and the 12-member advisory board. McQuade said previous privacy officers were attorneys for the Maine State Police who were also part of the center's "self-selecting" board, which reviews policy and produces regular audits. Though he said he understands how having an auditor could be duplicative, McQuade said the bill's language is "much stronger" and raises the standard. Having an independent position written into Maine law would result in clearer, well-defined audits, even if the current officer works for the attorney general's office, he said. Casavant said his team has taken steps since 2020 and is continuing to evolve and review their standards "as the world changes and as the mission changes," citing the annual reports and privacy audits. "I don't think that people were really asking a lot of questions about anything for a long time, so we didn't know what we didn't know," Casavant said. "When you start getting questions about how you operate and what your mission is, you try to answer as many of those as you possibly can. We certainly have taken many steps to answer those questions." He said representatives from the center have participated in work sessions, public hearings and have a standing invitation out to the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee to visit the center and ask questions. But the nature of their investigative works means they can't share a lot of details about what they have. "It's unfortunate that, in law enforcement, we can't just provide every single detail, just by the shared nature of the work that we do," Casavant said. "It could compromise a victim or safety of others. But we have taken some substantial steps to increase the amount of information that we share." Copy the Story Link
Yahoo
28-02-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Lawmakers try again to hire auditor to oversee Maine's secretive state police intelligence unit
Feb. 28—Some Maine lawmakers are renewing efforts to tap into what's happening inside the state's secretive — and controversial — police intelligence unit. The Maine Information and Analysis Center, also called the MIAC, has been the subject of controversy since 2020 when a whistleblower complaint said the center was illegally monitoring and storing data on civilians. A subsequent document leak also revealed that it had disseminated what some called shoddy intelligence that infringed on people's civil rights. Ever since, lawmakers have been trying to either close the center entirely, or hire an independent auditor to oversee its work. The bill, LD 419, would create an auditing position within the Maine Office of the Attorney General to oversee accountability and transparency of the center, as well as accept questions and complaints. Lawmakers from the Legislature's Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee heard mixed testimony at a public hearing Wednesday, with some saying the agency already provides regular reports. "I think the exact asks of this bill are the exact things that we're doing today," MIAC's director Lt. Mathew Casavant said in a phone interview Thursday. "We've taken every one of those steps to do everything that's outlined in the bill presently. If an auditor would allow for some increased transparency, there's no issue on our end." The proposal was resurrected from last year — it had passed in both chambers but died at the end of the session without funding. Supporters say the bill provides clearer, more proactive guidance for the new role and may contribute to increased transparency. Its sponsor, Rep. Grayson Lookner, D-Portland, told the committee Wednesday that the auditor would ensure that the agency follows its privacy policies and respects all Mainers. "This lack of transparency is a direct threat to civil liberties and undermines the trust between Mainers and their government," Lookner said. "The MIAC was created to protect us, not to spy on us. Its current practices are a betrayal of its original mission and a violation of the public trust." HISTORY OF CONTROVERSY The MIAC is run by the Maine State Police and the Maine Emergency Management Agency, and is one of 80 "fusion centers" in the United States that were created after the 9/11 terrorist attacks to prevent future threats by storing and sharing information — though many centers have focused more on domestic crimes. In 2020, Maine's fusion center came under fire after George Loder, a state trooper in Scarborough, said he was demoted after reporting illegal information collection practices such as storing personal identifying information on people who did not commit a crime. (He was awarded $300,000 in compensatory damages by a federal jury in 2022.) Later that year, data from the unit was made public after a nationwide hack of police intelligence showed the center had collected information on racial-justice protestors and others exercising their First Amendment rights. The center has been under increased scrutiny since then by lawmakers, who passed legislation in 2021 requiring the center to produce annual reports — which they have also criticized for not being detailed enough. Brendan McQuade, an assistant professor of criminology at the University of Southern Maine who studies fusion centers, testified in favor of the bill because he said it would be a good first step in establishing better oversight of the center. McQuade has also analyzed the MIAC with his law students and published a "shadow" report on the same day the center released its annual report in 2022. His version called out a flawed audit process and intelligence reports that violate privacy policies. "For me, this is a disparaging reminder of the effects of mass incarceration," McQuade said in a phone interview Thursday. "Things like mental illness, substance abuse, those are problems of security. Those are problems of the cops and courts. And that's a really clumsy tool to deal with those problems." RAISING THE STANDARD? But critics say hiring an auditor is unnecessary because it is essentially the same position as the center's privacy officer — who is also staffed within the attorney general's office and coordinates the regular audits and annual reports with an advisory board. York County Sheriff Bill King, who spoke against the proposal on behalf of the Maine Sheriffs Association, said he hasn't seen any privacy violations from a "boots on the ground" perspective, and worries the bill would be duplicative of the privacy officer's current role. If the bill were to pass, Casavant said, it may eliminate the need for the privacy officer and the 12-member advisory board. McQuade said previous privacy officers were attorneys for the Maine State Police who were also part of the center's "self-selecting" board, which reviews policy and produces regular audits. Though he said he understands how having an auditor could be duplicative, McQuade said the bill's language is "much stronger" and raises the standard. Having an independent position written into Maine law would result in clearer, well-defined audits, even if the current officer works for the attorney general's office, he said. Casavant said his team has taken steps since 2020 and is continuing to evolve and review their standards "as the world changes and as the mission changes," citing the annual reports and privacy audits. "I don't think that people were really asking a lot of questions about anything for a long time, so we didn't know what we didn't know," Casavant said. "When you start getting questions about how you operate and what your mission is, you try to answer as many of those as you possibly can. We certainly have taken many steps to answer those questions." He said representatives from the center have participated in work sessions, public hearings and have a standing invitation out to the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee to visit the center and ask questions. But the nature of their investigative works means they can't share a lot of details about what they have. "It's unfortunate that, in law enforcement, we can't just provide every single detail, just by the shared nature of the work that we do," Casavant said. "It could compromise a victim or safety of others. But we have taken some substantial steps to increase the amount of information that we share." Copy the Story Link
Arabian Business
06-02-2025
- Business
- Arabian Business
Qatar real estate trading hit $97m in a week
The volume of Qatar real estate trading in sales contracts registered with the Real Estate Registration Department at the Ministry of Justice reached QR 351,885,640 ($96.7m), during the period from January 26 to January 30. Total sales contracts for the real estate bulletin for residential units during the same period reached QAR76,419,927 ($21m). The weekly bulletin issued by the Department shows that the list of properties traded for sale included: Vacant lands Residential homes Apartment buildings Commercial buildings Shops Residential units Qatar real estate The sales operations were concentrated in the municipalities of Doha, Al Rayyan, Al Dhaayen, Al Wakrah, Umm Salal, Al Khor and Al Dhakira, and Al Shamal, in addition to the areas of the Pearl, Dafna 60, Lusail 69, Ghar Tha'alib, Legtaifiya and Umm Ebairiya. The volume of real estate trading in sales contracts registered with the Real Estate Registration Department at the Ministry of Justice was more than QR540m ($148.4m) during the period from January 19 to January 23.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Yahoo
Delta Air Lines flight canceled after flight crew made this mistake
Flight disruptions often stem from uncontrollable factors like weather or mechanical issues, but a recent Delta Air Lines flight was canceled after the flight crew accidentally deployed an emergency slide before takeoff. Delta Flight 419 was scheduled to depart Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on the evening of Jan. 23 and travel to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu. After the Boeing 767 arrived at SEA from its previous flight, crew members released the slide by mistake, the airline told USA TODAY. No injuries were reported. Since boarding had yet to begin, no passengers were on the plane at the time. Delta gets a makeover: Delta's planes have a new look and we're among the first to see inside The crew's allowable duty time expired before the aircraft was repaired, leading to the cancellation. "Flight 419 from Seattle (SEA) to Honolulu (HNL) was canceled due to damage to the aircraft before boarding," according to a Delta spokesperson. Delta rebooked the passengers onto other flights to Honolulu. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Delta flight canceled after crew accidentally deployed emergency slide
