Innovation and Impact: 60 Years of the Vera Institute of Justice
Innovation and Impact:
60 Years of the Vera Institute of Justice
Over 60 years, the Vera Institute of Justice’s impact has been widespread, resulting in measurable change in the criminal legal and immigration systems and spawning dozens of spin-off organizations, many of which are still highly regarded and operating in the space today. This timeline looks back at milestone moments in Vera’s history, placed in the context of historical events and landmark legislation that have shaped the landscape of the field.
1961
VERA MILESTONE
Vera Established
Millionaire industrialist Louis Schweitzer establishes the Vera Foundation, named after his mother, with an endowment of $70,000 and a mandate to “develop and apply programs for the furtherance of law, justice and civil liberties in the United States.”
1961
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Herb Sturz
Vera’s first executive director, Sturz shapes Vera’s early advocacy, developing experimental projects initially to assist people who could not afford bail but later expanding to promote diversion, replace arrest with treatment for people with substance use disorders, and assist people with histories of substance use and incarceration in finding housing and employment. By the time he left the position, Vera had opened offices in London and Paris.
1961
VERA MILESTONE
Manhattan Bail Project
Vera’s first project is the Manhattan Bail Project, which developed an early way of looking at a person’s community ties to encourage judges to release more people pretrial. This principle is still in use today nationwide.
1966
VERA MILESTONE
A New Name
With a five-year grant from the Ford Foundation, the Vera Foundation becomes the Vera Institute of Justice.
1966
HISTORICAL EVENT
Bail Reform
The Bail Reform Act of 1966 is signed into law. Judges are now required to base all pretrial bail decisions for people accused of federal crimes on factors like community and family ties. In his signing remarks, President Johnson credits Louis Schweitzer’s work in starting Vera and the Manhattan Bail Project with providing the basis for reforms.
1968
VERA MILESTONE
Court Employment Project
Vera’s Court Employment Project is an early diversion program combining career development and counseling with temporary employment as an alternative to incarceration. The project became part of the Center for Alternative Sentencing and Employment Services (CASES) in 1989 and is still active today.
1968
HISTORICAL EVENT
Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968
The Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 provides $400M in funding for law enforcement.
1973
VERA MILESTONE
Legal Action Center
The Legal Action Center, established by Vera as an independent nonprofit, begins providing services that help remove barriers to success for people who have been convicted of crimes, people recovering from substance abuse disorders and, later, people with HIV/AIDS. The center is still active today.
1984
VERA MILESTONE
Community Patrol Officers
Vera and NYPD launch the Community Patrol Officer Program, meant to increase connections and improve relationships between police and the neighborhoods they monitor by returning police to foot patrols to better monitor so-called “quality-of-life” issues. In 1988, NYPD expanded the program citywide.
1986
HISTORICAL EVENT
Anti-Drug Abuse Acts
The federal Anti-Drug Abuse Acts of 1986 and 1988 encode sentencing disparities such as a 100:1 crack to powder cocaine ratio.
1988
VERA MILESTONE
NYPD Civilian Oversight
Vera releases a study on the Civilian Complaint Review Board, the police oversight organization responsible for reviewing misconduct claims. The study concludes that the board has failed to improve perceptions of police fairness or accountability and is an “insufficient component of the Department’s approach to controlling officer misconduct."
1991
HISTORICAL EVENT
Crime Rate Peaks
The crime rate in the United States reaches an all-time high, then declines steadily.
1994
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Christopher Stone
Stone takes the helm at Vera in 1994, the year that “tough-on-crime” legislation culminated in the 1994 Crime Bill, and faces a hostile local government as the election of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani signals a sea change in the city’s policies and a new focus on punitive responses to crime. Stone dramatically expanded the organization’s international work while building out national efforts on policing, domestic violence, and sentencing.
Christopher Stone (left) with Herb Sturz
1994
HISTORICAL EVENT
1994 Crime Bill
The Violent Crime Control and Enforcement Act (the 1994 Crime Bill) promises funding to states that increase “truth-in-sentencing” laws and limit access to parole. The United States continues to see a prison building boom, funded in part by federal dollars. Vera calls the Crime Bill “a fool’s bargain” to its local government partners but as an organization that intentionally maintains a low public profile, does not take a public stance on the legislation beyond publishing its text as an explainer.
2002
VERA MILESTONE
Legal Orientation Program for Immigrants
Legal Orientation Program for Immigrants The U.S. Department of Justice launches its Legal Orientation Program, which provides legal orientations and connections to legal aid for detained immigrants in removal proceedings.
2005
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Michael Jacobson
With Jacobson—New York City's correction commissioner from 1995 to 1998 and probation commissioner from 1992 to 1996—as executive director, Vera launches centers on Immigration and Justice, Sentencing and Corrections, and Youth Justice, as well as Vera’s New Orleans office after Hurricane Katrina. As the 2008 recession sparked interest in cost-saving alternatives to incarceration, Jacobson turned Vera’s focus to local and national projects, reinforcing the Institute’s position as a credible and valuable partner for local governments.
2005
VERA MILESTONE
DC Office
Vera opens an office in Washington, DC, to serve as a headquarters for the Institute’s work with the Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons. This office now plays an important role in Vera’s efforts to shape federal policy, serving as a conduit between Vera and DC-based partners, agencies, and decision-makers.
2010
HISTORICAL EVENT
Fair Sentencing Act
The federal Fair Sentencing Act passes, reducing but not eliminating sentencing disparities. The reduction applies prospectively only, leaving thousands in prison with lengthy sentences handed down under old guidelines.
2014
VERA MILESTONE
Raise the Age
Vera is instrumental in working with the Governor’s Commission on Youth, Public Safety, and Justice to develop a plan to raise the age of juvenile jurisdiction. As of October 2019, New York stops automatically prosecuting 16- and 17-year-olds as adults.
2015
VERA MILESTONE
Second Chance Pell
Vera’s work to establish access to college programming in correctional facilities results in the U.S. Department of Education’s Second Chance Pell Sites Initiative, through which Vera provides technical assistance to participating educational institutions and departments of correction. The work fuels Vera’s Unlocking Potential initiative and a campaign to overturn the 1994 ban on Pell Grants for incarcerated students.
2015
VERA MILESTONE
In Our Backyards
Vera’s research shows that incarceration growth is being driven by rural counties and small cities, even as large cities decarcerate. As part of its response to this trend, Vera creates the Incarceration Trends data tool, offering comprehensive, up-to-date jail information on a county-by-county basis to fill critical gaps for advocates and researchers. Vera’s In Our Backyards project documenting and confronting growth in rural incarceration also grows out of this work.
2017
HISTORICAL EVENT
Zero Tolerance
The federal government begins separating adults attempting to enter the country from children accompanying them. On May 17, 2018, the ad hoc policy becomes an official “zero tolerance” policy of detaining all people crossing the border without permission, including those seeking asylum, and referring them for prosecution. Children under 18 are placed in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Universal Representation
To combat federal anti-immigration policies, Vera launches the Safety and Fairness for Everyone (SAFE) Network, now the Advancing Universal Representation initiative. The project aims to provide publicly funded representation for all people facing deportation—as of 2022, there are 50 deportation defense programs across 21 states.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Closing Rikers
The Independent Commission on New York City Criminal Justice and Incarceration Reform, headed by the Honorable Jonathan Lippman, releases a report recommending the closure of New York City’s Rikers Island jail complex. Vera participated actively on the commission and helped develop the report.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Young Adults in Prison
T.R.U.E., a pilot program exploring the possibility of grounding the experience of incarceration in human dignity, opens at the Cheshire Correctional Institute in Connecticut and becomes the foundation of Vera’s Restoring Promise initiative. It is followed by programs in Colorado, Connecticut, Idaho, Massachusetts, North Dakota, and South Carolina, where young people aged 18–25 participate in group activities focused on mentorship, personal support, and healing.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Greater Justice New York
Vera launches Greater Justice New York, an interdisciplinary effort to address mass criminalization and mass incarceration in New York State, advocating for bail reform, decarceration, and reductions in police and jail spending statewide.
1964
VERA MILESTONE
Early Bail Reform
Vera and DOJ cosponsor the National Conference on Bail and Criminal Justice. Following the conference, an article reports that 100 cities in 28 states have undertaken bail reform projects, releasing as many as 25,000 people on their own recognizance by October 1965.
1964
HISTORICAL EVENT
Civil Rights Act of 1964
On July 2, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is passed. Just over two weeks later, Harlem is consumed by protests after a white police officer shoots and kills a 15-year-old Black boy named James Powell.
1964
VERA MILESTONE
Manhattan Summons Project
Between 1964 and 1967, when NYPD took it over, Vera’s Manhattan Summons Project shows that people with strong community ties who are issued summonses—rather than arrested—overwhelmingly return for their court dates.
1965
HISTORICAL EVENT
Voting Rights Act
The Voting Rights Act aims to prevent both overt and subtler practices that keep Black people from voting. But in the same year, President Johnson signs into law the Law Enforcement Assistance Act, which lays the ground for federal funding of “tough-on-crime” policies.
1967
HISTORICAL EVENT
The Long Hot Summer
In the “Long Hot Summer” of 1967, nearly 160 violent protests occur nationwide as the country pushes back against segregation, racially inequitable poverty, and unemployment. The Kerner Commission, convened to study the roots of the conflict, reports that “police have come to symbolize white power, white racism, and white repression.”
1967
VERA MILESTONE
The Bowery Project
Vera’s Bowery Project, a program designed to keep people with substance use disorders out of the criminal legal system, admits its first participant. In its first year, the program admits 2,387 people to voluntary treatment. By the second year, arrests for alcohol-related offenses in the Bowery, a mile-long stretch of Lower Manhattan, drop by 85 percent.
1970
HISTORICAL EVENT
Mass Incarceration
Scholars generally begin measuring the era of mass incarceration here; 161 people per 100,000 are incarcerated. The beginning of the dramatic growth in U.S. prison populations is sparked by increasingly punitive laws—such as Nixon’s War on Drugs, launched in 1971, and New York State’s 1973 Rockefeller Drug Laws.
1971
VERA MILESTONE
Employment Opportunities
Vera launches the Pioneer Messenger Service, employing formerly incarcerated people and people recovering from substance use disorders to deliver messages in Manhattan. By 1977, the project, later called Wildcat Services Corporation, employs approximately 1,500 people in a wide range of activities. Wildcat, since merged with another corporation, continues to provide transitional employment and job placement services today.
1978
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Michael E. Smith
Smith begins his career in Vera’s London office, then spends 16 years as executive director. Under his leadership, Vera guides a number of critical innovations in reform, including early experiments in holistic public defense, transitional employment for people returning from prison, community policing, and alternatives to incarceration.
1979
VERA MILESTONE
Felony Case Preparation Project
Vera and NYPD launch the Felony Case Preparation Project. From a law enforcement perspective, the project is a wild success, increasing indictments and convictions for robbery by nearly 50 percent and more than tripling the percentage of sentences of five years or longer in its first two years.
1979
VERA MILESTONE
Community Service Sentencing
Vera pilots the Community Service Sentencing Project, a post-conviction diversion program designed to provide alternatives to carceral sentences for people with prior convictions. As part of the foundation for this project, Vera worked to pass an amendment to New York law that explicitly allowed judges to sentence people to community service. The project continues today as part of the Center for Alternative Sentencing and Employment Services (CASES).
1990
VERA MILESTONE
CompStat
Vera lends staff to NYPD to begin work on a computer program that can compile and track data from beat officers. This “electronic beatbook” is deployed on a trial basis in 1993, and when combined with mapping technology eventually becomes the statistical tracking and evaluation tool known as CompStat. This tool revolutionizes policing, but is eventually weaponized to increase pressure on officers to deliver target numbers of citations, summonses, and arrests.
1990
VERA MILESTONE
Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem
Vera establishes the Neighborhood Defender Service as an independent nonprofit, offering effective, community-based representation to Harlem residents. The organization’s second office opens in Detroit, Michigan, in 2019.
1996
VERA MILESTONE
Center for Employment Opportunities
Vera’s Neighborhood Work Project (established in 1978) and Vocational Development Program (established in 1979) are spun off as the independent Center for Employment Opportunities.
1997
VERA MILESTONE
South African Bureau of Justice Assistance
The Bureau, established with assistance from Vera staff and institutionalized in 2004, built capacity in South Africa to plan, design, and evaluate practical innovations in the justice system.
2001
VERA MILESTONE
PARC
Vera launches the Police Assessment Resource Center, which works inside and outside of law enforcement environments to advance civilian oversight of policing. The project became an independent nonprofit in 2007.
2004
VERA MILESTONE
Altus Global Justice Alliance
Vera becomes a founding member of the Altus Global Justice Alliance, an international coalition of nonprofit and academic organizations to promote criminal legal reform and produces resources like Developing Indicators to Measure the Rule of Law: A Global Approach.
2006
VERA MILESTONE
Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons
Vera, with other organizations on The Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons, releases a report exposing the realities of life behind bars and making recommendations for correctional facilities to prioritize the health and safety of communities.
2007
VERA MILESTONE
New Orleans Office
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Vera opens its New Orleans office to advance reforms in the local criminal legal system.
2008
VERA MILESTONE
Common Justice
Vera establishes Common Justice, an alternative to incarceration program for young people that focuses on restorative justice. The program spins off to become an independent organization in 2017.
2009
HISTORICAL EVENT
Incarceration Peaks
Mass incarceration peaks, with more than 1.6 million people in U.S. prisons.
2009
VERA MILESTONE
California Office
Vera first staffs an office in Los Angeles, California, in 2009; by 2018, Vera announces significant expansion to work on projects in areas such as immigration, juvenile justice, reentry, and policing in the state.
2013
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Nicholas Turner
Turner, Vera’s first executive director of color, leads a major transformation in Vera’s work, shifting from a collection of demonstration projects to an approach that focuses on systemic issues like mass criminalization and mass incarceration. Under his guidance, the Institute articulates for the first time publicly a commitment to addressing systemic racism and naming the inequities of the criminal legal system.
2013
VERA MILESTONE
NYIFUP
Vera’s New York Immigrant Family Unity Project (NYIFUP), is launched to provide universal representation for detained immigrants. It quickly becomes the largest public defender program in the nation for people in immigration proceedings.
2013
HISTORICAL EVENT
Black Lives Matter
After the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin, a Black teen, racial justice in the U.S. reaches a watershed moment. When the police officer responsible for his death is acquitted in 2013, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi formalize the grassroots movement into Black Lives Matter (BLM), a global network focused on intervening in state-sanctioned violence toward Black communities. BLM is involved in protests such as those in 2014 after the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, as well as the 2020 worldwide anti-police violence protests following the murder of George Floyd.
2018
VERA MILESTONE
Reimagining Prison
As part of the Reimagining Prison project, Vera coordinates visits to Germany and Norway to examine seven prisons in these countries and how they foster human dignity behind bars. Delegates for these trips include corrections leaders and staff, funders, members of the media, and a bipartisan group of policymakers and advocates. Changes inspired by these visits include the C.O.R.E. units in South Carolina’s Turbeville and Lee Correctional Institutions, programs that focus on mentorship, independence, and life skills for young incarcerated people.
2019
VERA MILESTONE
Ending Girls’ Incarceration
Vera launches the Initiative to End Girls’ Incarceration, which aims to zero out the incarceration of all young people--including girls and gender-expansive youth--on the girls' side of the youth legal system. New York City has already made significant progress, with as many as 18 days of zero youth in girls’ detention facilities within a single month in 2021. Santa Clara County, California, has had more than 15 consecutive days of zero in girls' facilities. And in 2022, for the first time ever, there were no girls held at Hawaii's only long-term juvenile placement facility.
2019
VERA MILESTONE
New York Bail Reform
Historic New York State bail reform legislation ending money bail as of January 1, 2020, for people accused of most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies is the result of advocacy by Vera and a coalition of agency partners as well as grassroots activists. From January 2019 to January 2020, the statewide jail population drops by 30 percent. However, as bail reform begins taking undeserved blame for the rise in crime that accompanied the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, some steps are taken to roll back the legislation and “increase judicial discretion” in setting bail.
2020
HISTORICAL EVENT
Protests Against Police Violence
After the police killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, protests erupt worldwide, lasting into 2021 in some locations.
2020
VERA MILESTONE
A New Focus
Vera begins a three-year strategic planning process to chart the Institute’s focus on policy and work at scale; early outcomes include shifting away from centers as an organizational structure and focusing on nationally scaled initiatives, spinning off bodies of work like the Center for Victimization and Safety and federally contracted immigration work, and the creation of a 501(c)(4) organization called Vera Action, which becomes the Institute’s lobbying arm.
2020
VERA MILESTONE
Pell Grant Reinstatement
After a campaign by Vera and a coalition of advocates, Congress amends the Higher Education Act, restoring Pell Grant eligibility for people in prison. The new provision will take effect in 2023.
Innovation and Impact:
60 Years of the Vera Institute of Justice
Over 60 years, the Vera Institute of Justice’s impact has been widespread, resulting in measurable change in the criminal legal and immigration systems and spawning dozens of spin-off organizations, many of which are still highly regarded and operating in the space today. This timeline looks back at milestone moments in Vera’s history, placed in the context of historical events and landmark legislation that have shaped the landscape of the field.
1961
VERA MILESTONE
Vera Established
Millionaire industrialist Louis Schweitzer establishes the Vera Foundation, named after his mother, with an endowment of $70,000 and a mandate to “develop and apply programs for the furtherance of law, justice and civil liberties in the United States.”
1961
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Herb Sturz
Vera’s first executive director, Sturz shapes Vera’s early advocacy, developing experimental projects initially to assist people who could not afford bail but later expanding to promote diversion, replace arrest with treatment for people with substance use disorders, and assist people with histories of substance use and incarceration in finding housing and employment. By the time he left the position, Vera had opened offices in London and Paris.
1961
VERA MILESTONE
Manhattan Bail Project
Vera’s first project is the Manhattan Bail Project, which developed an early way of looking at a person’s community ties to encourage judges to release more people pretrial. This principle is still in use today nationwide.
1964
VERA MILESTONE
Early Bail Reform
Vera and DOJ cosponsor the National Conference on Bail and Criminal Justice. Following the conference, an article reports that 100 cities in 28 states have undertaken bail reform projects, releasing as many as 25,000 people on their own recognizance by October 1965.
1964
HISTORICAL EVENT
Civil Rights Act of 1964
On July 2, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is passed. Just over two weeks later, Harlem is consumed by protests after a white police officer shoots and kills a 15-year-old Black boy named James Powell.
1964
VERA MILESTONE
Manhattan Summons Project
Between 1964 and 1967, when NYPD took it over, Vera’s Manhattan Summons Project shows that people with strong community ties who are issued summonses—rather than arrested—overwhelmingly return for their court dates.
1965
HISTORICAL EVENT
Voting Rights Act
The Voting Rights Act aims to prevent both overt and subtler practices that keep Black people from voting. But in the same year, President Johnson signs into law the Law Enforcement Assistance Act, which lays the ground for federal funding of “tough-on-crime” policies.
1966
VERA MILESTONE
A New Name
With a five-year grant from the Ford Foundation, the Vera Foundation becomes the Vera Institute of Justice.
1966
HISTORICAL EVENT
Bail Reform
The Bail Reform Act of 1966 is signed into law. Judges are now required to base all pretrial bail decisions for people accused of federal crimes on factors like community and family ties. In his signing remarks, President Johnson credits Louis Schweitzer’s work in starting Vera and the Manhattan Bail Project with providing the basis for reforms.
1967
HISTORICAL EVENT
The Long Hot Summer
In the “Long Hot Summer” of 1967, nearly 160 violent protests occur nationwide as the country pushes back against segregation, racially inequitable poverty, and unemployment. The Kerner Commission, convened to study the roots of the conflict, reports that “police have come to symbolize white power, white racism, and white repression.”
1967
VERA MILESTONE
The Bowery Project
Vera’s Bowery Project, a program designed to keep people with substance use disorders out of the criminal legal system, admits its first participant. In its first year, the program admits 2,387 people to voluntary treatment. By the second year, arrests for alcohol-related offenses in the Bowery, a mile-long stretch of Lower Manhattan, drop by 85 percent.
1968
VERA MILESTONE
Court Employment Project
Vera’s Court Employment Project is an early diversion program combining career development and counseling with temporary employment as an alternative to incarceration. The project became part of the Center for Alternative Sentencing and Employment Services (CASES) in 1989 and is still active today.
1968
HISTORICAL EVENT
Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968
The Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 provides $400M in funding for law enforcement.
1970
HISTORICAL EVENT
Mass Incarceration
Scholars generally begin measuring the era of mass incarceration here; 161 people per 100,000 are incarcerated. The beginning of the dramatic growth in U.S. prison populations is sparked by increasingly punitive laws—such as Nixon’s War on Drugs, launched in 1971, and New York State’s 1973 Rockefeller Drug Laws.
1971
VERA MILESTONE
Employment Opportunities
Vera launches the Pioneer Messenger Service, employing formerly incarcerated people and people recovering from substance use disorders to deliver messages in Manhattan. By 1977, the project, later called Wildcat Services Corporation, employs approximately 1,500 people in a wide range of activities. Wildcat, since merged with another corporation, continues to provide transitional employment and job placement services today.
1973
VERA MILESTONE
Legal Action Center
The Legal Action Center, established by Vera as an independent nonprofit, begins providing services that help remove barriers to success for people who have been convicted of crimes, people recovering from substance abuse disorders and, later, people with HIV/AIDS. The center is still active today.
1978
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Michael E. Smith
Smith begins his career in Vera’s London office, then spends 16 years as executive director. Under his leadership, Vera guides a number of critical innovations in reform, including early experiments in holistic public defense, transitional employment for people returning from prison, community policing, and alternatives to incarceration.
1979
VERA MILESTONE
Felony Case Preparation Project
Vera and NYPD launch the Felony Case Preparation Project. From a law enforcement perspective, the project is a wild success, increasing indictments and convictions for robbery by nearly 50 percent and more than tripling the percentage of sentences of five years or longer in its first two years.
1979
VERA MILESTONE
Community Service Sentencing
Vera pilots the Community Service Sentencing Project, a post-conviction diversion program designed to provide alternatives to carceral sentences for people with prior convictions. As part of the foundation for this project, Vera worked to pass an amendment to New York law that explicitly allowed judges to sentence people to community service. The project continues today as part of the Center for Alternative Sentencing and Employment Services (CASES).
1984
VERA MILESTONE
Community Patrol Officers
Vera and NYPD launch the Community Patrol Officer Program, meant to increase connections and improve relationships between police and the neighborhoods they monitor by returning police to foot patrols to better monitor so-called “quality-of-life” issues. In 1988, NYPD expanded the program citywide.
1986
HISTORICAL EVENT
Anti-Drug Abuse Acts
The federal Anti-Drug Abuse Acts of 1986 and 1988 encode sentencing disparities such as a 100:1 crack to powder cocaine ratio.
1988
VERA MILESTONE
NYPD Civilian Oversight
Vera releases a study on the Civilian Complaint Review Board, the police oversight organization responsible for reviewing misconduct claims. The study concludes that the board has failed to improve perceptions of police fairness or accountability and is an “insufficient component of the Department’s approach to controlling officer misconduct."
1990
VERA MILESTONE
CompStat
Vera lends staff to NYPD to begin work on a computer program that can compile and track data from beat officers. This “electronic beatbook” is deployed on a trial basis in 1993, and when combined with mapping technology eventually becomes the statistical tracking and evaluation tool known as CompStat. This tool revolutionizes policing, but is eventually weaponized to increase pressure on officers to deliver target numbers of citations, summonses, and arrests.
1990
VERA MILESTONE
Neighborhood Defender Service of Harlem
Vera establishes the Neighborhood Defender Service as an independent nonprofit, offering effective, community-based representation to Harlem residents. The organization’s second office opens in Detroit, Michigan, in 2019.
1991
HISTORICAL EVENT
Crime Rate Peaks
The crime rate in the United States reaches an all-time high, then declines steadily.
1994
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Christopher Stone
Stone takes the helm at Vera in 1994, the year that “tough-on-crime” legislation culminated in the 1994 Crime Bill, and faces a hostile local government as the election of Mayor Rudolph Giuliani signals a sea change in the city’s policies and a new focus on punitive responses to crime. Stone dramatically expanded the organization’s international work while building out national efforts on policing, domestic violence, and sentencing.
Christopher Stone (left) with Herb Sturz
1994
HISTORICAL EVENT
1994 Crime Bill
The Violent Crime Control and Enforcement Act (the 1994 Crime Bill) promises funding to states that increase “truth-in-sentencing” laws and limit access to parole. The United States continues to see a prison building boom, funded in part by federal dollars. Vera calls the Crime Bill “a fool’s bargain” to its local government partners but as an organization that intentionally maintains a low public profile, does not take a public stance on the legislation beyond publishing its text as an explainer.
1996
VERA MILESTONE
Center for Employment Opportunities
Vera’s Neighborhood Work Project (established in 1978) and Vocational Development Program (established in 1979) are spun off as the independent Center for Employment Opportunities.
1997
VERA MILESTONE
South African Bureau of Justice Assistance
The Bureau, established with assistance from Vera staff and institutionalized in 2004, built capacity in South Africa to plan, design, and evaluate practical innovations in the justice system.
2001
VERA MILESTONE
PARC
Vera launches the Police Assessment Resource Center, which works inside and outside of law enforcement environments to advance civilian oversight of policing. The project became an independent nonprofit in 2007.
2002
VERA MILESTONE
Legal Orientation Program for Immigrants
Legal Orientation Program for Immigrants The U.S. Department of Justice launches its Legal Orientation Program, which provides legal orientations and connections to legal aid for detained immigrants in removal proceedings.
2004
VERA MILESTONE
Altus Global Justice Alliance
Vera becomes a founding member of the Altus Global Justice Alliance, an international coalition of nonprofit and academic organizations to promote criminal legal reform and produces resources like Developing Indicators to Measure the Rule of Law: A Global Approach.
2005
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Michael Jacobson
With Jacobson—New York City's correction commissioner from 1995 to 1998 and probation commissioner from 1992 to 1996—as executive director, Vera launches centers on Immigration and Justice, Sentencing and Corrections, and Youth Justice, as well as Vera’s New Orleans office after Hurricane Katrina. As the 2008 recession sparked interest in cost-saving alternatives to incarceration, Jacobson turned Vera’s focus to local and national projects, reinforcing the Institute’s position as a credible and valuable partner for local governments.
2005
VERA MILESTONE
DC Office
Vera opens an office in Washington, DC, to serve as a headquarters for the Institute’s work with the Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons. This office now plays an important role in Vera’s efforts to shape federal policy, serving as a conduit between Vera and DC-based partners, agencies, and decision-makers.
2006
VERA MILESTONE
Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons
Vera, with other organizations on The Commission on Safety and Abuse in America’s Prisons, releases a report exposing the realities of life behind bars and making recommendations for correctional facilities to prioritize the health and safety of communities.
2007
VERA MILESTONE
New Orleans Office
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Vera opens its New Orleans office to advance reforms in the local criminal legal system.
2008
VERA MILESTONE
Common Justice
Vera establishes Common Justice, an alternative to incarceration program for young people that focuses on restorative justice. The program spins off to become an independent organization in 2017.
2009
HISTORICAL EVENT
Incarceration Peaks
Mass incarceration peaks, with more than 1.6 million people in U.S. prisons.
2009
VERA MILESTONE
California Office
Vera first staffs an office in Los Angeles, California, in 2009; by 2018, Vera announces significant expansion to work on projects in areas such as immigration, juvenile justice, reentry, and policing in the state.
2010
HISTORICAL EVENT
Fair Sentencing Act
The federal Fair Sentencing Act passes, reducing but not eliminating sentencing disparities. The reduction applies prospectively only, leaving thousands in prison with lengthy sentences handed down under old guidelines.
2013
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Nicholas Turner
Turner, Vera’s first executive director of color, leads a major transformation in Vera’s work, shifting from a collection of demonstration projects to an approach that focuses on systemic issues like mass criminalization and mass incarceration. Under his guidance, the Institute articulates for the first time publicly a commitment to addressing systemic racism and naming the inequities of the criminal legal system.
2013
VERA MILESTONE
NYIFUP
Vera’s New York Immigrant Family Unity Project (NYIFUP), is launched to provide universal representation for detained immigrants. It quickly becomes the largest public defender program in the nation for people in immigration proceedings.
2013
HISTORICAL EVENT
Black Lives Matter
After the 2012 shooting of Trayvon Martin, a Black teen, racial justice in the U.S. reaches a watershed moment. When the police officer responsible for his death is acquitted in 2013, Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi formalize the grassroots movement into Black Lives Matter (BLM), a global network focused on intervening in state-sanctioned violence toward Black communities. BLM is involved in protests such as those in 2014 after the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, as well as the 2020 worldwide anti-police violence protests following the murder of George Floyd.
2014
VERA MILESTONE
Raise the Age
Vera is instrumental in working with the Governor’s Commission on Youth, Public Safety, and Justice to develop a plan to raise the age of juvenile jurisdiction. As of October 2019, New York stops automatically prosecuting 16- and 17-year-olds as adults.
2015
VERA MILESTONE
Second Chance Pell
Vera’s work to establish access to college programming in correctional facilities results in the U.S. Department of Education’s Second Chance Pell Sites Initiative, through which Vera provides technical assistance to participating educational institutions and departments of correction. The work fuels Vera’s Unlocking Potential initiative and a campaign to overturn the 1994 ban on Pell Grants for incarcerated students.
2015
VERA MILESTONE
In Our Backyards
Vera’s research shows that incarceration growth is being driven by rural counties and small cities, even as large cities decarcerate. As part of its response to this trend, Vera creates the Incarceration Trends data tool, offering comprehensive, up-to-date jail information on a county-by-county basis to fill critical gaps for advocates and researchers. Vera’s In Our Backyards project documenting and confronting growth in rural incarceration also grows out of this work.
2017
HISTORICAL EVENT
Zero Tolerance
The federal government begins separating adults attempting to enter the country from children accompanying them. On May 17, 2018, the ad hoc policy becomes an official “zero tolerance” policy of detaining all people crossing the border without permission, including those seeking asylum, and referring them for prosecution. Children under 18 are placed in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Universal Representation
To combat federal anti-immigration policies, Vera launches the Safety and Fairness for Everyone (SAFE) Network, now the Advancing Universal Representation initiative. The project aims to provide publicly funded representation for all people facing deportation—as of 2022, there are 50 deportation defense programs across 21 states.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Closing Rikers
The Independent Commission on New York City Criminal Justice and Incarceration Reform, headed by the Honorable Jonathan Lippman, releases a report recommending the closure of New York City’s Rikers Island jail complex. Vera participated actively on the commission and helped develop the report.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Young Adults in Prison
T.R.U.E., a pilot program exploring the possibility of grounding the experience of incarceration in human dignity, opens at the Cheshire Correctional Institute in Connecticut and becomes the foundation of Vera’s Restoring Promise initiative. It is followed by programs in Colorado, Connecticut, Idaho, Massachusetts, North Dakota, and South Carolina, where young people aged 18–25 participate in group activities focused on mentorship, personal support, and healing.
2017
VERA MILESTONE
Greater Justice New York
Vera launches Greater Justice New York, an interdisciplinary effort to address mass criminalization and mass incarceration in New York State, advocating for bail reform, decarceration, and reductions in police and jail spending statewide.
2018
VERA MILESTONE
Reimagining Prison
As part of the Reimagining Prison project, Vera coordinates visits to Germany and Norway to examine seven prisons in these countries and how they foster human dignity behind bars. Delegates for these trips include corrections leaders and staff, funders, members of the media, and a bipartisan group of policymakers and advocates. Changes inspired by these visits include the C.O.R.E. units in South Carolina’s Turbeville and Lee Correctional Institutions, programs that focus on mentorship, independence, and life skills for young incarcerated people.
2019
VERA MILESTONE
Ending Girls’ Incarceration
Vera launches the Initiative to End Girls’ Incarceration, which aims to zero out the incarceration of all young people--including girls and gender-expansive youth--on the girls' side of the youth legal system. New York City has already made significant progress, with as many as 18 days of zero youth in girls’ detention facilities within a single month in 2021. Santa Clara County, California, has had more than 15 consecutive days of zero in girls' facilities. And in 2022, for the first time ever, there were no girls held at Hawaii's only long-term juvenile placement facility.
2019
VERA MILESTONE
New York Bail Reform
Historic New York State bail reform legislation ending money bail as of January 1, 2020, for people accused of most misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies is the result of advocacy by Vera and a coalition of agency partners as well as grassroots activists. From January 2019 to January 2020, the statewide jail population drops by 30 percent. However, as bail reform begins taking undeserved blame for the rise in crime that accompanied the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, some steps are taken to roll back the legislation and “increase judicial discretion” in setting bail.
2020
HISTORICAL EVENT
Protests Against Police Violence
After the police killing of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, protests erupt worldwide, lasting into 2021 in some locations.
2020
VERA MILESTONE
A New Focus
Vera begins a three-year strategic planning process to chart the Institute’s focus on policy and work at scale; early outcomes include shifting away from centers as an organizational structure and focusing on nationally scaled initiatives, spinning off bodies of work like the Center for Victimization and Safety and federally contracted immigration work, and the creation of a 501(c)(4) organization called Vera Action, which becomes the Institute’s lobbying arm.
2020
VERA MILESTONE
Pell Grant Reinstatement
After a campaign by Vera and a coalition of advocates, Congress amends the Higher Education Act, restoring Pell Grant eligibility for people in prison. The new provision will take effect in 2023.