NEW YORK - What happens when social activists and corporate executives are thrown together in a conference setting over two days in a Wall Street meeting place?

The people who put together Commit!Forum2012 say good things happen, and that the world moves a little bit toward a better place.

The forum, sponsored by Corporate Responsibility magazine, brought together executives from companies such as AT&T and UPS with activists such as environmentalist Bobby Kennedy, Jr.

"We all tend to isolate ourselves. Environmentalists talk to environmentalists and watch MSNBC. Wall Street moguls talk to other Wall Street moguls and tycoons and watch Fox News. And never the twain shall meet."

But meet they did, in discussions centered on such issues as crony capitalism and the nation's fiscal and sustainability deficits. Mild sparks flew occasionally, but most participants said it was worth searching for common ground on which to tinker with free-market capitalism despite its excesses and shortcomings.

Robert Shapiro, former President Clinton's chief economic adviser, took part in a concurrent series of events called the "UnConvention," bringing together business leaders with political types from both the left and right.

"We need to find all sorts of forums and occasions and mechanisms to bring together business and the increasing demands of a general public that increasingly feels short-changed."

Bill Shireman is president and chief executive of Future 500, a consultancy that tries to bridge the gap between corporations and nonprofit groups. He organized the UnConvention.

"We have representatives from the Sierra Club that are here, we have representatives from Greenpeace, and from oil companies. We have the largest corporations and the most impassioned activist groups, right here."

Kennedy told corporate executives that in his view, injury to the environment equals deficit spending, in that the cost will become due down the road.

"Environmental injury is about loading the costs of our generation's prosperity onto the backs of our children, and onto the poorest members of our society who always shoulder the disproportionate burden of environmental injury."


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The ACLU of Connecticut has sued the governor's and attorney general's offices, saying the state's prison debt law violates the excessive-fines clause of the U.S. Constitution.

Since 1997, Connecticut law has required people who have been in prison to repay the state for the cost of their incarceration. The state's set cost is currently $249 a day, or more than $90,000 per year, according to the complaint.

Dan Barrett, legal director for the ACLU of Connecticut, argued it is an exorbitant amount of money for a single year of incarceration, and disproportionately impacts Black and Latino communities.

"We're manufacturing yet another barrier for people to build wealth, to accumulate things like real property," Barrett contended. "So prison debt falls very heavily and prevents people from doing things like inheriting their childhood home or leaving property to their children."

About seven out of 10 people in Connecticut's prisons are people of color. The class-action lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court. A spokesperson for Attorney General William Tong said they are reviewing the lawsuit and cannot comment on specific claims. She added there is a proposal before the Legislature to repeal the cost-of-incarceration statute.

The suit's plaintiffs are Teresa Beatty and Michael Llorens, and was filed on behalf of more than 30,000 people who have been incarcerated in the state since 1997.

Barrett explained the goal of the case is to eliminate the debt of those who are or have been in prison.

"When we win, the federal court will strike those laws. It will declare them to be unconstitutional," Barrett emphasized. "They will be off limits to the state for use. And additionally, we have asked that the federal court declare that anyone with outstanding prison debt as a result of these unconstitutional laws does not owe the debt."

Beatty's prison debt amounts to more than $83,000 for two years of being incarcerated. Llorens owes the state more than $272,000 for a three-year sentence. Gov. Ned Lamont's and Attorney General Tong's offices have 20 days from filing to respond to the lawsuit.

Every 30 seconds in the U.S. a Latino citizen turns 18, and it is Latino Advocacy Week, the second annual initiative where community leaders champion causes supporting Latinos across the nation.

This week, a series of events, meetings and webinars will be held by various community groups, nonprofits and elected officials across the country.

Jessica Godinez, conservation program manager for the Hispanic Access Foundation, said her organization advocates for issues including education, environmental justice and voting rights.

"Our hope is to really provide our community with the resources and the training to take leadership of their own advocacy," Godinez explained.

As of 2020, Godinez pointed out there were 32 million Hispanic-identified voters in the US. More than half the country's population growth comes from the Hispanic community.

From 2016 to 2020, Latino voter turnout tripled. Godinez noted Latinos make up 18% of the population, but only account for 1% of elected officials.

"We're motivated after the 2020 election where Latino voter turnout in battleground states was three times greater than in 2016," Godinez remarked.

According to the Hispanic Access Foundation, Latinos represent the largest untapped segment of the population when it comes to civic engagement and political potential.

One push this year in Texas is to recognize significant historical sites for the Latino community as national monuments.

Moses Borjas, pastor of Living Covenant Church in El Paso, strongly supports preserving historical culture, and he hopes President Joe Biden will proclaim the Castner Range a national monument.

"Keeping our lands open to get people involved with trails and climbing mountains," Borjas emphasized. "It's going to help our mental health, It's going to help our spiritual side, it's going to help our emotional side."

The Castner Range is a sight to see, Borjas contends, home to wildlife, special plants and grasses. The Antiquities Act of 1906 authorizes the president to protect areas of historical or scientific significance.

Efforts to end executions in Ohio have reached a historic point.

An invitation-only hearing will be held by the House Criminal Justice Committee today on legislation which would end Ohio's death penalty. It's the fifth hearing on House Bill 183, and the farthest a death penalty repeal bill has gone in the legislative process.

Allison Cohen, director of communications for the group Ohioans to Stop Executions, said the measure has record bipartisan support.

"Four Senate Republicans joining seven Senate Democrats on the Senate bill and seven House Republicans joining 18 House Democrats on the House bill," Cohen outlined. "I think that people would be surprised at how much support there is on both sides of the aisle for repealing the death penalty."

A fiscal analysis of the bill estimated it would result in annual savings in both time and resources for the Attorney General, the state public defender, county prosecutors and courts. However, the Department of Rehabilitation and Correction would likely experience long-term cost increases because of the need to house certain offenders for longer prison sentences.

According to the ACLU, while comprising only 13% of the population, nearly 60% of people awaiting execution are Black.

Demetrius Minor, national manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty, contended the racial bias imposed by the criminal-justice system and the death penalty must be recognized.

"It is essential that we acknowledge the harm that has occurred through the justice system and work together regardless of political beliefs and affiliations to address the disparities," Minor asserted. "And for Black Americans, the sting of being targeted and oppressed is still being felt today."

Opponents of repeal argued capital punishment is reserved for the most horrific crimes where the offender is beyond rehabilitation. But Cohen countered it is not how it is applied in Ohio, noting the vast majority of people on death row are from a handful of counties.

"When people talk about, well, we need it for the worst of the worst, we're really not talking about the worst of the worst," Cohen emphasized. "We're talking about keeping the death penalty for murders from well-funded counties where the prosecutor has a predilection toward seeking the death penalty."

Nearly two dozen states have already abolished the death penalty.