Open Society Institute – Baltimore
Open Society Institute (OSI) – Baltimore : Audacious Thinking For Lasting Change
It must be lost in the jumbled priorities of Washington. And it’s a real shame. Because with a little help, cities like Baltimore could bail out the entire country. Everyone seems to agree that America needs to become energy independent. And that we need to find a way to lower energy prices. And that we […]
Crime is falling in Baltimore and fewer women are being held in the Baltimore city jail. Plans developed several years ago to build a large women’s jail facility at a cost of roughly $181 million were based on a prediction of increasing crime rates and higher jail populations that never materialized. Clearly, these plans should […]
Al Jazeera America recently ran an op-ed by Laura I. Appleman, associate dean of faculty research and a professor of law at Willamette University. In the op-ed, Appleman writes about the harm done when the voice of the community is removed from the criminal justice system. This exclusion of the public, she says, “is draining […]
Editor’s note: In conjunction with OSI-Baltimore’s forum series, The Burden of Bail, Audacious Ideas is pleased to feature a month-long blog series about pre-trial detention and bail reform. This is the last post in the series.
It can be fairly said, the events of the past four months have advanced in a positive way, the right to counsel in Maryland. The plaintiffs, public defenders and advocacy groups in the Richmond litigation and before the legislature have shed light like never before on the unfairness and injustices in the pretrial detention of poor people in the State of Maryland.
In the U.S, nearly all arrested people are required to pay cash bail in order to be released from jail before trial, yet more than 3 in 5 inmates remain behind bars, unconvicted, because they cannot afford to pay.
In the U.S, nearly all arrested people are required to pay cash bail in order to be released from jail before trial, yet more than 3 in 5 inmates remain behind bars, unconvicted, because they cannot afford to pay. Please join OSI-Baltimore for #unconvicted, a photographic exhibit which documents the plight of pretrial detainees, many […]
In the Summer 2016 issue of OSI-Baltimore’s newsletter, Audacious Ideas, we announce our plans for the Solutions Summit on December 10, check in with some of our Community Fellows as they work to build an alumni network, and highlight the effects of a cash bail system that punishes the poor. Included are photos featured in […]
TODAY, the Baltimore Sun published an op-ed by Public Defender and OSI-Baltimore Leadership Council member, Todd Oppenheim. In “Baltimore’s Mandatory minimum madness,” Oppenheim calls the newly-proposed mandatory minimum sentencing for illegal handgun possession a “shortsighted attempt to curb violence through incarceration.” Mandatory minimum sentences do not increase public safety and restrict judges ability to rule […]
On Tuesday, Public Defender and OSI-Baltimore Leadership Council member Todd Oppenheim held a Bail Info Session at the Motor House in Station North, hosted by Maryland Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts and Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance. Participating in the conversation along with Oppenheim were Caryn York, leader of bail-reform advocacy group Coalition for a Safe and Just Maryland (Open […]
Join OSI and the Enoch Pratt Free Library on March 8th for a talk with Peter Edelman and Lester Spence at the Church of the Redeemer. Edelman, the Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Law and Public Policy and the faculty director of the Center on Poverty and Inequality at Georgetown University Law Center will be discussing his book, […]
OSI-Baltimore has permanently closed. It has been our honor and privilege to partner with and serve the Baltimore community for the past 25 years.
This website is available for historical purposes. It is no longer being updated.