March 25, 2014
The Colorado Department of Corrections (CDOC) has released a new policy on the treatment of prisoners with serious mental illness that will go into effect on April 1, 2014.  The policy provides for increased out of cell time and individual therapeutic contacts for prisoners with serious mental illness and/or developmental disabilities housed in CDOC’s residential treatment programs (RTP).  The policy adopts a broadened definition of “serious mental illness” and mandates the following:

1. Prisoners diagnosed with a “serious mental illness” are to be considered for placement in an RTP within 30 days of diagnosis.
2. All RTP prisoners are to receive twenty hours of out-of-cell time every week, including ten hours of dedicated therapeutic activity.
3. Many RTP prisoners are required to receive frequent one-on-one mental health contacts with a consistent mental health provider.

Statement of ACLU Staff Attorney Rebecca Wallace

“The ACLU of Colorado commends Colorado Department of Corrections Executive Director Rick Raemisch and his staff who have shown remarkable leadership on this issue.
“Adoption of this policy is a momentous step toward ensuring that prisoners with a serious mental illness are not held in solitary confinement and will receive meaningful out-of-cell mental health treatment.”
Read the new policy here: http://www.doc.state.co.us/sites/default/files/ar/0650_04_040114.pdf

DENVER – In response to a letter from the ACLU of Colorado, DISH Network has agreed to make several improvements on their accommodations for nursing mothers.

On March 12, the ACLU of Colorado sent a letter of complaint to DISH Network documenting multiple failures to accommodate nursing mothers at DISH Network’s corporate headquarters in Englewood, where employees are forced to pump breast milk in front of their co-workers and supervisors without privacy screens or curtains, and at a DISH Network call center in Littleton, where the lactation room is located inside a bathroom in direct violation of federal and state law.

Late in the afternoon of Friday March 21, the ACLU received a response from DISH Network promising new accommodations for nursing employees.

“DISH is to be commended for promptly committing to address the problems outlined in our letter and for taking significant strides to protect the rights of nursing mothers in the workplace,” said ACLU of Colorado staff attorney Rebecca Wallace.

They have promised to provide multiple private places for several nursing mothers to express milk simultaneously in the Englewood office as well as the relocation of the lactation room in the Littleton office out of the bathroom. They have also indicated they are “undertaking a company-wide assessment of the accommodations provided to nursing mothers,” and have identified a human resources manager whose duty it is to ensure compliance with laws regarding nursing employees. DISH’s letter emphasized the company’s commitment to providing a healthy, safe and family-friendly workplace.

“By bringing the story of nursing employees at DISH to light and enforcing state and federal laws protecting nursing mothers in the workplace, the ACLU hopes to change the old-fashioned view held by some employers that a model employee is one that does not get pregnant, does not give birth, does not breast feed, and does not have child-care responsibilities,” added Wallace. “DISH’s steps in promptly resolving the complaints raised in our letter serves as a model to other employers.”

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BOULDER - “The ACLU of Colorado is disappointed that the City of Boulder has decided to add its name to the long and growing list of municipalities around the state that have responded to poverty on their streets and in their public spaces by increasing surveillance, adding new criminal penalties, and giving more tools to police and municipal judges to push homeless and poor people out of their communities.
“Two years ago, in a letter supporting the Boulder City Council’s decision to eliminate jail time for a number of minor offenses, many of which are unevenly enforced against the homeless and poor, the ACLU of Colorado Boulder County chapter wrote that ‘Incarceration is an extreme violation of liberty and should be reserved for the most serious violations and violators.’ At the time, the Council agreed.
“Now, just two years later, the Council has reversed that decision and plans to use the new ordinances to ‘take back public spaces’ by pushing disfavored members of the public out of them. Pushing the homeless out of one location only increases the problem of homelessness in other locations. Rather than spending public resources on more aggressive law enforcement, harassment, and incarceration, communities like Boulder would be better served by focusing that funding on programs that actually address and help to solve root causes of poverty.”