FAIR

CHANCE
HIRING
IN ORANGE
COUNTY
Opportunity for Job Seekers,
Employers, and Communities

In partnership with the

Community Empowerment Fund
We are so happy to hear of your interest in becoming a Fair Chance Certified
Business in Orange County! Fair Chance hiring is an incredibly impactful practice
to take on, especially considering that one third of Americans have a criminal
record. Here at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice and the Community
Empowerment Fund, we believe that we are not the worst of our mistakes.
Therefore, we strongly encourage businesses and nonprofit organizations to
create an inclusive hiring practice that selects candidates on their qualifications,
rather than their past mistakes.

In order to become Fair Chance Certified, we ask that you complete the
following items:

• Remove
• Remove all all questions
questions about
about criminal
criminal records
records from
from thethe
jobjob application
application form.
form.
• If•you
If you must
must askask about
about a criminal
a criminal background,
background, delay
delay asking
asking until
until thethe
applicant is
applicant is given
given a conditional offer. a conditional offer.
• Give
• Give employees
employees a chance
a chance to to
seesee
anyany background
background checks
checks you you
run.run.

To confirm that you have done the above items, we will request a copy of all
your job application forms. We also ask that you fill out a comprehensive survey
that not only asks about Fair Chance Hiring, but collects demographic
information on your business so that we can better understand which industries
are open to Fair Chance Hiring.

After we have reviewed your materials, we will send you an email regarding your
status. If there are areas that need to be improved upon, we will work with you
until you meet the certification requirements.

As part of the certification, you will become part of a growing community of

businesses that can network and collaborate on best hiring practices. As the
certification program grows, we also hope to offer educational events, window
stickers, and other swag to showcase the great work you are doing.

We thank you for your time and energy on this effort. Your investment in the
community is so greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

The Fair Chance Team

Fair Chance Hiring: Opportunity for
Individuals, Communities, Businesses,
and the Economy
Between 70 and 100 million people – as many as one in three Americans – live with a
criminal record, a result of our country’s public policies feeding mass incarceration.1
Over 600,000 people make the transition from prison back home to their families and
communities each year.2 The difficulty of this transition is compounded by collateral
consequences - in policy, practice, and public will - that create barriers to stable
employment and other vital services. Research shows that removing unjust barriers to
employment benefits individuals, families, communities, businesses and the economy.3

Securing and holding a job that supports self-sufficiency is crucial to successful

re-entry, but job seekers with criminal records face immense obstacles and structural
discrimination in the job market. As a result, more than 60 percent of individuals who
have been incarcerated are unemployed the year after being released and those who
are able to find employment bring home less pay – up to 40 percent less.4 Black and
Latine people, already overrepresented in every stage of the criminal legal system, face
increased discrimination. Research shows that Black applicants with a criminal record
receive significantly fewer job interviews than white applicants with similar histories.5
A lack of stable employment is the single most important predictor of recidivism —
moreover, the destructive and inequitable cycle of reentry into poverty has immensely
detrimental consequences for people with criminal records, their families, and
communities.6

Fair chance hiring considers an applicant’s qualifications first, without the stigma of a
conviction or arrest record. Removing questions about criminal records from the early
stages of the application process is usually the first step in fair chance hiring practices.7
Given that 92 percent of employers choose to conduct criminal background checks on
job applicants, fair practices on background check policies are also crucial.8 The EEOC
has laid out guidance on the use of records.9 Additional best practices include:

• ensuring the applicant has the opportunity to check for accuracy;

• limiting the number of people who read the record and ensuring they are
trained; and
• giving the applicant an opportunity to provide evidence of rehabilitation.10

Support for fair chance public policies has grown over the last two decades, borne
from the efforts of All of Us or None, a grassroots organization of people who have
been incarcerated, their family members, and allies.11 To date, 36 states and over 150
 cities and counties have adopted fair chance policies.12 The majority of these policies,
while crucial, only apply to public sector employers. Only 14 states and 20 localities
have adopted fair chance policies that apply to the private sector.13 Of these states and
localities, almost none are located in the South.

Fair chance policies benefit people with criminal records, their families, communities,
businesses and the economy.14 Not only have fair chance policies proven to be
effective in helping people with criminal records find and keep stable employment, the
single most important predictor of recidivism, these policies also increase the
economic security of children and families and the health of communities.15 Moreover,
fair chance policies help businesses find valued employees, substantiating the research
that employees with records are retained at higher rates, reducing turnover, and
constituting “a better pool for employers.”16 More than 100 companies – including
Google, Pepsico, and Xerox – signed the White House Fair Chance Business Pledge in
2016, citing strong support of economic opportunity for all.17

Ban the Box in North Carolina: The Durham Second Chance Alliance (DSCA) – led by directly affected
communities – successfully advocated for the City of Durham and Durham County to ban the box for
public employees in 2011 and 2012. Since 2012, the number of people with criminal records hired by
Durham County nearly tripled. Fifteen additional counties and four cities in North Carolina have since
followed suit and in 2020, Governor Roy Cooper signed Executive Order 158 to implement fair chance
and “Ban the Box” policies at state agencies.

See: Southern Coalition for Social Justice, The Benefits of Ban the Box: A Case Study of Durham (2018).

1 The Sentencing Project, 2015. “Americans with Criminal Records,” Poverty and Opportunity Profile: http://www.sentencingproject.org/wp
content/uploads/2015/11/Americans-with-Criminal-Records-Poverty-and-Opportunity-Profile.pdf
2 Prison Policy Initiative, July 2018. “Out of Prison & Out of Work: Unemployment Among Formerly Incarcerated People” https://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/outofwork.html
3 National Employment Law Project, 2016. “Research Supports Fair Chance Policies” https://www.nelp.org/publication/research-supports-fair chance- policies/#_edn1
4 The Sentencing Project, 2015. “Americans with Criminal Records,” Poverty and Opportunity Profile: http://www.sentencingproject.org/wp
content/uploads/2015/11/Americans-with-Criminal-Records-Poverty-and-Opportunity-Profile.pdf
5 Pager, Devah, 20013. “The Mark of a Criminal Record,” American Journal of Sociology Vol 108, no. 5: http://scholar. harvard.edu/files/pager/files/pager_ajs.pdf
6 Ibid.
7 Note that recent studies have also found that ban the box policies may have unintended consequences in decreasing the probability of employment among young, low-skilled black
men. See Raphael, Steven, 2020. “The Intended and Unintended Consequences of Ban the Box” Annual Review of Criminology.
8 See Southern Coalition for Social Justice, 2018. “The Benefits of Ban the Box: A Case Study of Durham” https://southerncoalition.org/wp
content/uploads/2018/11/BantheBox_WhitePaper.pdf
9 EEOC, 2012. “Enforcement Guidance on the Consideration of Arrest and Conviction Records in Employment Decisions under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act”
10 See Southern Coalition for Social Justice, 2018. “The Benefits of Ban the Box: A Case Study of Durham” https://southerncoalition.org/wp
content/uploads/2018/11/BantheBox_WhitePaper.pdf
11 All of Us or None: https://prisonerswithchildren.org/about-aouon/
12 NELP, 2020. “Ban the Box: US Cities, Counties, and States adopt Fair-Chance Policies” https://s27147.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/Ban-the Box-Fair-
Chance-State-and-Local-Guide-Oct-2020.pdf
13 Ibid
14 National Employment Law Project, 2016. “Research Supports Fair Chance Policies” https://www.nelp.org/publication/research-supports-fair chance- policies/#_edn1
15 Almost half of US children have at least one parent with a record. Vallas, Rebecca et al., 2015. “Removing Barriers to Opportunity for Parents with Criminal Records and Their Children”
Center for American Progress: https://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp content/uploads/2015/12/09060720/CriminalRecords-report2.pdf. See also Berg, Mark T. and Huebner, Beth M.,
2011. “Reentry and the Ties that Bind: An Examination of Social Ties, Employment, and Recidivism,” Justice Quarterly (28)
www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07418825.2010.498383?journalCode=rjqy20#preview
16 ACLU Foundation, 2017. “Back to Business: How Hiring Formerly Incarcerated Job Seekers Benefits Your Company”
https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/field_document/060917-trone-reportweb_0.pdf
17 The White House, 2016. Fact sheet: “White House Launches the Fair Chance Business Pledge,” www.whitehouse.gov/the-press office/2016/04/11/fact-
sheet-white-house-launches-fair-chance-business-pledge