CAMPAIGN FOR THE FAIR SENTENCING OF YOUTH
Our seed money helped the Campaign for Fair Sentencing of Youth in its unique role of coordinating, and sometimes developing, the strategies implemented by advocates around the country working to end the practice of sentencing youth to life without parole. The Campaign is composed of advocates, lawyers, religious groups, mental health experts, victims and families directly impacted by this sentence, who believe that young people deserve the opportunity to give evidence of their remorse and rehabilitation. While a recent Supreme Court case ruling that it is unconstitutional to sentence youth who did not kill or intend to kill to life without parole was a significant victory, much work still needs to be done to abolish extreme sentencing. Through coalition building, public education, strategic advocacy, collaboration with litigators and a variety of other means the Campaign will continue its work until extreme sentencing for youth is abolished.
TEXAS DEFENDER SERVICE
Our support helped enable TDS to influence the development and the actual quality of direct legal services for capital public defender units in the State of Texas, including the regional capital public defender office in West Texas and the recently-created Office of Capital Writs for state habeas corpus representation. The creation of these two offices represent a major opportunity for improvement in the quality of capital representation by creating a system with accountability, oversight and enhanced professionalism, and will serve as a model as the state continues its progress toward indigent defense delivery systems that best ensure quality representation. Since the creation of these offices the quality of public defense in Texas has improved and the number of cases resolved with a life verdict have risen.
LONDON CITIZENS
Butler has supported the London Citizen's Affordable Housing Campaign, which is dedicated to ensuring access to permanently affordable housing in the British capital's poorest boroughs. London Citizens – the UK's largest and most diverse community alliance, with over 140 social institutions in membership – is striving to establish the UK's first ever urban Community Land Trust in London's east end. Butler's support has enabled them to organize local residents, identify a site, bring together like-minded developers and architects, and engage with the site owners who are now negotiating the transfer of land into a trust which will be owned by the local community. This former hospital site, still known as St. Clement's, hopes to deliver over 60 new land trust homes that will be opened in 2012 in time for the London Olympic Games. They will then look to replicate the model across east London, as a way of ensuring a permanent legacy of affordable housing across the land that will be opened up after the Games.
MICHIGAN ORGANIZING PROJECT
In 2006, Kalamazoo County implemented the Low Income Housing Assistance Fund totaling $1.5 million, the result of MOP's three years of work in coalition. Butler provided grants for advocacy. In 2009, we again supported MOP as they undertook to build a broad coalition to support a campaign for permanent funding of the trust fund.
NATIONAL PEOPLE'S ACTION COMMITTEE
Since 2008, Butler has supported NPA's Housing Justice Movement which provides training and technical assistance to local community and tenant organizing groups fighting for housing rights. Through collective training, advocacy and organizing work, NPA seeks to win concrete policy victories that advance the human right to housing in federal policy and dramatically improve access to affordable housing for low-income families. NPA's Housing Justice Movement Campaign is currently negotiating with HUD to strengthen a proposal that would drastically change the face of every HUD-Assisted housing program in the country. NPA is also working to help revise HUD regulations in order to allow formerly incarcerated people to gain greater access to HUD-Assisted housing.