More than 153,000 Kentuckians are still being denied the right to vote because of a past felony conviction, according to recent data from the League of Women Voters of Kentucky.

More than 191,000 Kentuckians regained the right to vote under Gov. Andy Beshear's 2019 executive order, yet the report found the Commonwealth of Kentucky disenfranchised more than 4.5% of its voting-eligible population in last year's presidential election.

Tip Moody, member of the League of Women Voters of Kentucky, said the state is experiencing a troubling trend.

"We are now number four in the country," Moody pointed out. "We are worse in our percentage of disenfranchised citizens than we were two years ago."

Between April 2020 and last Jan. 2, the Kentucky Department of Corrections vetted and forwarded 815 individual petitions requesting a partial pardon to the Office of the Governor. So far during his time in office, Beshear has granted 114 pardons.

Becky Jones, vice president of the League of Women Voters of Kentucky, said the state has lagged behind on the issue of voting rights restoration because it has not been a priority among lawmakers.

"I think it could be a priority for legislators if the public started applying pressure to them to make them understand how important it is to them," Jones observed. "We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people that have been affected."

Kentucky is one of only three states in the country to disenfranchise or strip away the right to vote for a citizen who has committed a felony offense for the rest of their life.

Moody explained he had his voting rights restored but pointed out the journey for most other residents is an uphill battle.

"People like me, regardless of what is in our past and what we are doing in our present, there is still a stigma associated with that, and there is a lack of value," Moody added.

The report showed nearly 2,000 Kentuckians with felony convictions had their sentences extended in the past year, because they could not pay what the court ordered them to pay, creating a further barrier to having the means to begin the voting rights restoration process.


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Next month, the city of Morgantown, West Virginia, will ask residents to vote on whether to keep or eliminate a city ordinance banning camping on public property, enacted last year.

Sarah Hutson, a volunteer for the advocacy group West Virginia Can't Wait, said Morgantown has struggled with affordable housing and a lack of resources for years. She pointed out the city has only 28 shelter beds for an unhoused population of around 150 individuals.

"This is an expensive waste of taxpayer money to just put folks in jail rather than actually provide solutions that would end homelessness in Morgantown," Hutson argued.

An estimated 150 cities in 32 states have passed ordinances aimed at discouraging homelessness, according to the National Criminal Justice Association. The U.S. Supreme Court has also weighed in on the issue. In a 2024 ruling, justices found a camping ban in Grants Pass, Oregon, did not violate the Constitution's cruel and unusual punishments clause.

Hutson added the number of Morgantown residents who came together and gathered signatures on a petition to put the issue on the ballot highlights the momentum against criminalizing not having a place to live.

"It was an incredible force of effort," Hutson observed. "It was also easy, in that most people that we talked to, at most doors that we knocked, were more than happy to sign. They also see that this is not a solution."

Hutson noted groups like West Virginia Can't Wait have continued to push affordable housing and increased services for unhoused people to the top of local city council agendas, statewide.

"To work with our elected officials on city council to introduce pro-housing solutions and ordinances that would help make a difference in this fight." Hutson urged.

Data from the Pew Research Center show in cities across the nation, places where rents increased faster than the national average have seen sharp spikes in the number of homeless residents.


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An audit by Allegheny County reveals most public defenders face excessive caseloads and a lack of resources, putting clients at a disadvantage.

It showed 36 of 42 trial attorneys carry caseloads above the national average.

Robert Perkins, attorney for the Allegheny Lawyers Initiative for Justice, said the state has a history of underfunding public defenders, allowing only $100,000 per county annually. But he added it is the first time the county controller's office has reviewed public defense, focusing on areas of improvement in a neglected system.

"On average, your typical public defender, trial lawyer has two or three times as many cases as they should," Perkins pointed out. "You can be the best lawyer in the world. If you have triple the caseload that you should per national standards, then you can't do a good job for every client. You end up having to pick and choose."

Perkins noted while the American Bar Association outlines 10 key principles for an effective public defense system, the recent audit only examined one for both the Public Defender and court-appointed counsel systems. He argued a deeper review would have shown both fall short of most bar association standards. The study also found the court-run indigent defense system violates standards.

Sarah Linder Marx, senior deputy of public outreach and staff development for the Allegheny County Office of the Public Defender, said she is concerned the audit implied clients must meet requirements beyond those outlined in the Public Defender Act to qualify for a public defender attorney. Specifically, she emphasized the audit suggested stricter income verification measures.

Under the Public Defender Act, individuals qualify based on income eligibility and sign an affidavit confirming their income falls below the poverty line percentage indicating indigence.

"In practice, we would be asking people who are already extremely vulnerable to get us documentation that may not even exist for them," Linder Marx stressed. "We don't have software or access to government documents like other government agencies do to verify income like that."

Linder Marx's office also recommended implementing new case management software would greatly improve the ability to manage workloads and provide opportunities for analysis. The current case management software is dated and inadequate, often creating more work.


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An Illinois documentary takes a deep dive into the Illinois Prisoner Review Board and the politics that influence its decision-making through one man's fight for a second chance.

"In their Hands" follows the life of Ronnie Carrasquillo, who was charged with murdering a plainclothes Chicago police officer in 1976. He was 18 years old when a judge sentenced him to 200 to 600 years in prison. Despite earning a bachelor's degree in theology and creating a committee with other prisoners focused on education and rehabilitation, Carrasquillo was denied parole more than 30 times.

"Every year I went to the parole board, they said, 'You're the same guy, you're still the same gang kid, you're still the same gang leader,'" Carrasquillo recounted. "So they can evolve, but they want to marginalize me and hold me in that position that 'you're still this.' So I used to say, 'I'm the oldest 18-year-old that you know.'"

Carrasquillo spent nearly 50 years in prison before finally being released at age 65 in 2023. An appellate court ruled his sentence was excessive and his profuse parole denial unfair. The film is available on all PBS digital platforms.

Carrasquillo grew up in Chicago during a time where racial violence and street gangs were prevalent. Along with highlighting the factors leading to Carrasquillo's crime, the documentary offers a snapshot of the kinds of extreme sentences young people receive that lead to mass incarceration.

Dan Protess, producer and director of the documentary, said he used Carrasquillo's story to expose the systemic issues in the criminal legal system, including how officials prioritize economic interests over rehabilitation.

"Who are these parole board members?" Protess asked. "What are the political considerations in their appointment? Who in Springfield, the state's capital, is looking over their shoulders? And what other parties might be able to influence them in their decision-making?"

Protess added he hopes the film draws attention to the parole process he believes often gets overlooked, and the great need for reform.

According to state law, the review board consists of 15 people appointed by the governor and the Senate, who must have five years of experience in areas ranging from law and policing to medicine and social work. At least six must also have juvenile experience and no more than eight members may be of the same political party.


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