LaTonya A. Tate didn’t intentionally start on a career path to put herself on the Birmingham, Alabama, City Council, to be the Chair of its Public Safety Committee, but she has found herself where she needs to be right now. Please join us as we talk with Councilor Tate about her remarkable path, and how she wields power—and hope—to make change possible.
LaTonya A. Tate's journey started as a nurse, then, in a turn, as a parole officer, then to founding the Alabama Justice Initiative and running for and winning a seat on the Birmingham City Council. All along the way, her family and her community have been close to her heart, and their struggles have built her into a force for change across Alabama, including stopping, for now, a new prison.
As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, The Aspen Institute is nonpartisan and does not endorse, support, or oppose political candidates or parties. Further, the views and opinions of our guests and speakers do not necessarily reflect those of The Aspen Institute.
Visit us online at The Aspen Institute Criminal Justice Reform Initiative and follow us on Twitter @AspenCJRI.
Shades of Freedom
Episode 13
Transforming Pain into Purpose
Guest: LaTonya Tate
May 12, 2022
Copyright 2022 Aspen Institute Criminal Justice Reform Initiative
Announcer (00:00):
Welcome to Shades of Freedom from the Aspen Institute's Criminal Justice Reform Initiative. Be sure to never miss an episode by subscribing to Shades of Freedom on your favorite podcast app. This episode's guest is LaTonya Tate, Chair of the Birmingham City Council Public Safety Committee and Executive Director of the Alabama Justice Initiative.
LaTonya A. Tate (00:25):
We really hold the power. We are the power brokers. And so the goal is to get out here. And this is what I tell people in the community being a Councilor, you are the power broker. I'm your advocate. I'm your mouthpiece. And so exercise that power. Most people have lost hope. And so it's going to take people like myself and others to really get out in these communities and dig deep and bring that level of hope back, to get people know that you are the power brokers and the makers, and you got the power to change and shape anything in this state that you want to see happen.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (01:02):
Welcome to Shades of Freedom. I'm your host, Douglas Wood, Director of the Aspen Institute's Criminal Justice Reform Initiative. LaTonya Tate believes that reform should be collective and community-based. She puts that theory into practice as a city council member and leading voice of criminal justice reform, not only in her hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, but nationally as well.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (01:27):
Before becoming a council member and Chair of Public Safety, LaTonya founded the Alabama Justice Initiative, which seeks to end mass incarceration and change criminal justice policy in Alabama. She was formerly a parole officer for nearly a decade. Holds multiple degrees in criminal justice and public administration and was named as Soros Justice Fellow. It's a pleasure to have her as our guest today. LaTonya, welcome to Shades of Freedom.
LaTonya A. Tate (01:55):
Thank you for having me. I'm so delighted to be here with you and the listening audience today.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (02:03):
That's great. I really am looking forward to this conversation. You've had other jobs in your career, but when did you realize that justice reform was going to be your life's work?
LaTonya A. Tate (02:15):
Well, I did not realize justice reform was going to be my life work early on, in my growing up, in my college years, starting out as a nurse. I've always wanted to be a nurse. I always wanted to be in the field of serving. My grandparents, who were hardworking people, my grandmother was a homemaker. My grandfather retired from a local pipe shop here where he worked for almost 40 years.
LaTonya A. Tate (02:44):
My mom being a postal worker. So all of that stuff played and my grandmother loves to cook. So all of that played into servantship. I found myself all the time when we were growing up playing and my brothers got hurt or people getting hurt in the community, I always wanted to be the one to make their boo boos well or putting band aids on, whatever they had going on.
LaTonya A. Tate (03:07):
So I just knew early on that I wanted to be into some type of servant leadership role. And so nursing was just something that I desired to do. So I went to nursing school, started out in LPN school and the goal was to go back to be a nurse anesthetist, but then life, some terms changed and some things happened in life with my son, at the age of 18, being arrested and then at the age of 19 being sentenced to a 20 year prison sentence in the state of Alabama. And so it was during that time, I didn't know a whole lot about laws or the criminal justice field, because I was only for me was getting a parking ticket, going to court and paying it. But it got much more deeper than that for me.
LaTonya A. Tate (03:52):
And that was the turning point, that I knew that I had to really dig in, because my son was young. Had never been any trouble. He was taken away from the family and going to prison. And that led me back into picking up where I had left off and getting my degree in criminal justice, while working full time with the Jefferson County Health Department. And so I went back and acquired my Bachelor's of Science in criminal justice, security and administration from the University of Phoenix. And that led me into my career changing.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (04:31):
And so being from Birmingham, what ways does the justice system play an outsize role in the city of Birmingham and for community members?
LaTonya A. Tate (04:43):
Well, being from Birmingham, Alabama, the Civil Rights capital, where people know us for all the Civil Rights and Dr. Martin Luther King coming here and going to jail himself, fighting for equality for marginalized communities. And so that role that it plays and what we see is community organizing and being an African American woman is, leading an organization around criminal justice reform, that whole spectrum when it comes to parole, mass incarceration, just the things that you are seeing the Black and brown communities being affected by.
LaTonya A. Tate (05:19):
We know that we really have to be very intentional or on coming together organized. We may not all agree to disagree, but we know that when we do come together collectively, that we coming together for a sole mission and that's just to end things that are practices and harmful practices that have criminalized Black and brown communities.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (05:42):
When you were running for city council, you emphasized community involvement, revitalization, and safety as key to your platform. What does it look like now that you're in office and how have you engaged the community to create solutions to injustice?
LaTonya A. Tate (05:59):
With public safety, being the first African American woman in this state to chair Public Safety is just unheard of, especially coming from the [inaudible] days, you wouldn't had a black woman leading Public Safety, but it weighs heavy on me, because I go to bed every night thinking about what can I do that others have not done to drive change, to do things differently?
LaTonya A. Tate (06:22):
So I'm often in conversation with the mayor about what we can do to drive our community and say, but we do know that is going to take a collective of people, because we've had three shootings here, deadly shootings here. And so we have to really be intentional and at some point, it has to become personal to people in community, that the police cannot do this by themselves.
LaTonya A. Tate (06:47):
It has to become personal, because when you have people running around town in a broad day light shooting guns and have no regard for life, when does it come personal with people in community? When does this become personal that a bullet does not have eyes, it could hit you at any given day. And so we have to ... that's my message to people, being chair of Public Safety. This has to be personal to you. It really has to be personal.
LaTonya A. Tate (07:15):
And then we come with these real-time solutions where we work with grassroots organizations and people that we can deploy into the community, to become violence interrupters and clergy, and just a collective body of people reimagining what our communities can really look like and really diving in deep and holding those that are doing things accountable. And hopefully we can turn their life around and start leading them into a positive direction.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (07:41):
I want to continue on what you were saying about this becoming personal. What needs have community members shared with you when it comes to public safety? What have they talked to you about?
LaTonya A. Tate (07:53):
Well, they want to see more community policing. They want to see more police being personal with people in the community. Right now we know across the country, it's a big distrust. And so I think we have to really sit down and have these hard conversations that people are not ready for it, but it's time that we move in that direction and start doing some healing and reconciliation, because that's so super important.
LaTonya A. Tate (08:19):
That's the only way that we're going to be able to move forward, when we start seeing how can we come in and have this collective conversation? Yeah, we may scream, fuss and fight, but at the end of the day, we all want the same thing. And that's the things that, people that talking to police officers, being a chair of Public Safety, most people recognize who I am when I'm out in public and we have this conversation.
LaTonya A. Tate (08:40):
And what they appreciate is… I understand. I've been in those situations. Being an African American female, working in a rural white town, being and supervising 95% people that were on my caseloads were Caucasian individuals. So I was in high intensity, every day in high intensity danger, every day for my life. And so I just really have to thank God that He kept and He protected me during those times. But I understand and most people don't understand, when you’re in these high tense situations, I'm not by no means sidelining with anybody to go into situations. And your first defense is deadly.
LaTonya A. Tate (09:23):
No, I'm not saying that. So I want the listener audience to understand that's not what I'm saying, but at some point we're going to have to come together and get together and make sure that we are at least having conversation, and the trust factor has to be there. And making sure that we’re working with grassroots organizations that can provide the resources and the tools and the skills that people in community need.
LaTonya A. Tate (09:47):
I'm working really hard. And like I was telling you guys, that I am looking at some other measures, we know that mental illness and homelessness is a big crisis across the country, but do we really need police going in, trying to assist people that are already traumatized? And so I'm a proponent that we really need to deploy people that are mental health professionals, people that work with the homeless population to get the skills and tools that the people need, to start turning their life around. So those are the ways that I'm looking at holistic ways. And so let me make this real clear, very holistic ways where community is involved, where we take care of our own people.
LaTonya A. Tate (10:33):
And so we want to be able to do that. We want to be able to provide resources for people that need groceries. Or we want to make sure that we have the healthcare that people need, and be able to point to the resources. So that's what I'm about when it comes to public safety, making sure that we have the resources, making sure that every collective body from community to clergy, healthcare, education, all these systems talking together like you say, is so super important that we invest in this data and governance, and so that's what I'm about: holistic approach. Making sure that we can chime in on where we need to deploy resources. And we know that data is going to be very important for us to do that.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (11:17):
You mentioned just a second ago about the importance of healing and reconciliation and given Birmingham's history, and as you said, being the seat of the Civil Rights Movement, what does healing and reconciliation look like?
LaTonya A. Tate (11:33):
Nobody is born to be a criminal. I tell people, I carried a child for nine months. I didn't birth a criminal. So I make that real clear. My son did not come into this world to be a criminal, but I do know that generational curses are flowing down through the family unit. And I really believe that we, in order for families to be healed and made whole, and for those that are marginalized, we got to make sure that we got the right people that are healing, healing, healing, justice people, restorative justice individuals.
LaTonya A. Tate (12:11):
They have been trained, because you have to have people that have this training to know, to be able to go into a community, to be able to even start this process. So that's super important, to make sure that we are not sending people in community causing further harm just doing things because they say, this is what I believe needs to happen.
LaTonya A. Tate (12:32):
No, we need the real professionals. And so we want to work with those that have been highly trained in restorative work, healing, justice work, healing practices, transformative justice, to come into Birmingham. Work with me and get those that want to go into these marginalized community, housing units and start this process and start working this thing from the inside out.
LaTonya A. Tate (12:57):
And so I do know that looks like we got to go and get the whole family unit. When you start working with a young man that has traveled down the road and he's traveling down the wrong road and is justice impacted. We got to go back and get the mother, the sister, the brother. We got to go back and start that healing process with the whole family and let that spread around.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (13:20):
So we talked about the fact that you founded the Alabama Justice Initiative. Can you describe the work of the initiative and its goals?
LaTonya A. Tate (13:29):
Well, Alabama Justice Initiative was, they say, turn your pain into purpose. And so actually when I went in – in 2018 - was selected as a Soros Justice Fellows with 15 other amazing individuals. And so Alabama Justice was a part of my project. My project was probation and parole practices in Alabama, and it was birthed. And the goal for that organization mission, and I'm just paraphrasing, the mission is to work with - directly impact - the formerly incarcerated people and community members, to teach them how to organize and advocate for legislative change.
LaTonya A. Tate (14:07):
And so I really believe if anything is going to change here, we have to know the machines that we are fighting. We have to know what makes it turn, what's the next screw that we need to put in to keep it going and to destroy. So I really believe that in order to destroy any system, you need to know what makes that system move. And what are the players in organizing. We know who our people are. Who are the people that we need to be targeting, to get the real accomplishment that we are trying to do. So the goal of the organization is to get directly formerly incarcerated people and community members, and give them the tools and skills they need to learn how to advocate and learn the legislative landscaping, the process here in Alabama.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (14:52):
And can you describe the impact that the Alabama Justice Initiative has had thus far?
LaTonya A. Tate (15:02):
Oh wow. Yes. We've had some great wins. Recently two years ago, and we still here today, we actually launched a campaign that's called Communities Not Prison, when we learned that the DOJ had filed a report in 2018 under the Trump administration saying that Alabama had the worst prisons in the nation. And so we quickly took heed to that. And so we saw the many deaths that was occurring in the prison system on a daily basis. Our prison system turning into a mental health ward.
LaTonya A. Tate (15:35):
Most people are in prison, just strung out on drugs. And so many suicides committed at an all time rate, even correctional staff, police brutality on the inside. So we knew that we had to really spring into action. And so we launched a campaign called Communities Not Prison. Really we replicated after Close the Jail ATL, by Women on the Rise, the racial justice organization over there.
LaTonya A. Tate (16:01):
And we replicated that initiative where Miss Marilynn Winn, who runs Women on the Rise had started that initiative. And we replicated it and called our campaign Communities Not Prison to change that. And knew that we had to start attacking this prison bill. And so we were able to, in the beginning to stop the prison construction and where we were able to get Barclays, Key Banks, [inaudible], and a mutual fund to just walk away from the prison construction deal, a 30 year prison lease construction deal. Was able to go in and kill the momentum and just kill all the players who include Core Civic, who was actually had gotten a contract with the prisons to build. And so shortly after we did that, of course, the state of Alabama and the legislators and our governor was not happy about that.
LaTonya A. Tate (16:56):
They came back in and called a special session and was able to sign into law where they were able to extract $400 million of the ARP money to build prisons. And so then we learned that the U.S. Treasury, one of their findings was that you could not construct buildings, prisons, or jails with this money. And so the governor is still going to try it. And so we just learned this week that they've signed a contract with Caldwell Construction, LLC, to build a 4,000 bed specialty prison in Elmore County.
LaTonya A. Tate (17:30):
So we are working hard to make sure that does not happen. So the work still continues to fight, still continues. So we have been ... we were successful doing that and we still are there. And so we've been doing another initiative called Participatory Defense, where we have been very successful in helping families, those that have been accused of a crime. And we were able to get charges dropped off a school teacher that was facing felony assault charges on the police officers. And so with Alabama Justice Initiative, we've started a fellowship that's called a Reimagine Justice Fellowship. So we are tweaking that right now to go back in and start that fellowship over. And we've graduated two cohorts. So we've graduated a total of 16 great organizers that we got out here in these communities, just doing some good work.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (18:22):
That's great. That's fantastic. Congratulations on that wonderful work. I wanted to go back to your time for moment as a parole officer, how does your experience as a parole officer inform your current work and what did it reveal to you about the justice system?
LaTonya A. Tate (18:40):
Well, my experience with a parole officer, I worked in a little small town called DeFuniak Springs, Florida, which is the panhandle. And so that really opened up my eyes being a black woman, the only African American female in the office. And at the time my son was sitting in an Alabama prison. And so my mindset was just different, being in a very powerful position where I could shape somebody's life or the way that I wanted it, whether I went in ... and everything was based off of how you felt. And so I knew I didn't want to be like that with people because my son was sitting in prison. I knew once he got released that I wanted to make sure that somebody treated him fair. And so I was on a different path.
LaTonya A. Tate (19:30):
I went to my circuit administrator and said, "I want to start going into inside the prisons, kind of educating people on reentry." So I started my ... I was named a Resource Officer in my office, because I was helping those that was on supervision. And so we were able to go in and ask some things like, "Okay, you need to go to treatment." What have we? And then we could put that into our recommendation. And that kept the persons in the community. You kept them planted in the community, but you got them to help that they needed, because jail is just, wasn't a place ... they wasn't going to get better in jail. So it didn't suit me to be that type of officer to send you to jail.
LaTonya A. Tate (20:14):
My goal was to help you. And so that was one way. And then I seen the disparities. My son went to prison for robbery one and was given a 20 year prison sentence. And I supervised individuals in Florida that had robbed people and they were on five years probation. So I saw those disparities and I could have took that personally and just made somebody's life just really uncomfortable, but that wasn't my goal. I didn't have that heart.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (20:40):
And what about it helped shape the way you think about your approach to criminal justice reform? What about that experience has helped your thinking around it?
LaTonya A. Tate (20:50):
That experience, again, I'm going to use my son as a scenario, where I saw my son, first time offender, armed robbery, 20 years, and where I saw somebody in Florida that was the first time offender, that was not the same color my son, had a five year, was on probation for five years. So that approach right there just really made me look at how unfair the criminal justice system was when it came to sentencing, your color, all of that. And so that just gave me a different scope and guided me to where I am today and leading me down the path of doing the work that I am doing today.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (21:30):
So what long term hopes do you have for Birmingham? And what do you wish to see your community achieve, particularly when it comes to criminal justice transformation?
LaTonya A. Tate (21:40):
The long term hope that I have for Birmingham is for us to keep moving very progressively, but making sure that every neighborhood and every person that lives in the neighborhood is served in such a way that we all are on level playing fields, it's equality all across the board for everyone. And so the long term hopes that I have for criminal justice transformation and reform in Alabama, is to make sure that we get into our community and educate those that have lost hope when it comes to voting, civic engagement, when it comes to the electoral process.
LaTonya A. Tate (22:27):
Getting so strong, where we can be like Vote that's in New Orleans, that's ran by Norris Henderson and Bruce Riley and that group of people. That those guys that are formerly incarcerated that have really, really made a mark on criminal justice reform and changing laws, when people are running for office, that we shift this power. So we got this big, we got these formerly incarcerated directly impacted people and community members hold this power, where candidates have to come to us to be vetted, to get our approval to run for office.
LaTonya A. Tate (23:05):
And where we become so strong C4 PACs, where we become so strong, where we are holding the power, because actually we really hold the power. We are the power brokers. And so the goal is to get out here, and this is what I tell people in community being a Councilor, you are the power broker. I'm your advocate, I'm your mouthpiece. And so exercise that power. So we want to make sure that we deploy that back out into communities and building up power and letting people know nothing runs unless you approve it.
LaTonya A. Tate (23:41):
And so in order for a person to be elected for office, you have to prove it for them to be there. And that's the same thing that we can take throughout this nation, right here in Alabama. We can be so powerful, where we can shape our next governor. You say Alabama is red, but we don't believe that. We believe the reason that it is red, because most people have lost hope. And so it's going to take people like myself and others to really get out in these communities and dig deep and bring that level of hope back, to get people know that you are the power brokers and the makers, and you got the power to change and shape anything in this state that you want to see happen.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (24:21):
We always ask our guests the same final question on Shades of Freedom, which is this: when you hear the phrase, Shades of Freedom, what does it mean to you, now and for the future?
LaTonya A. Tate (24:37):
I envision shades of freedom where we all can just come together, the Black, brown, Indigenous, all colors of people coming together as one, and really just magnifying and honing in on what Dr. King believed in, equality for every boy, woman, girl, man. People just coming together and just celebrating. And that's what I think about shades of freedom, where we all safe in community. Nobody is afraid of nobody.
LaTonya A. Tate (25:14):
When I think about how I grew up, when it comes to shade of freedom, we knew everybody on the block and we were able to get along. If you didn't have something, somebody else had it. That's what I equate shades of freedom to and when I think about shades of freedom, again, thinking about looking from sitting on my grandfather's porch and my grandparents' porch on Saturdays when my grandfather went to the farmer's market and even his own garden. Going back to those golden old days. So that's what I think about when it comes to shades of freedom, quality education, quality healthcare for all, all across the board, everybody is equal. That's what I think about when I think about shades of freedom.
Dr. Douglas E. Wood (26:03):
Well, Councilor Tate, it has been such a pleasure having you on our podcast, Shades of Freedom. And we wish you all the best in all the great work you're doing. Not only in Birmingham and Alabama, but for the country.
LaTonya A. Tate (26:15):
Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you.
Announcer (26:21):
Thanks for joining us for Shades of Freedom from the Aspen Institute's Criminal Justice Reform Initiative. We'll be back soon with more thought provoking guests. So please subscribe on your favorite podcast app, or you can find all of our past episodes by visiting our website at www.aspeninstitute.org/CJRI.
Announcer (26:46):
This podcast was engineered and produced by Natalie Jones with research assistance by Willem Patrick. It was edited by Ken Thompson, with production support by Christian Devers and Wanda Mann. CJRI's programs were made possible by support from Arnold Ventures, the Ballmer Group, the Bank of America Charitable Foundation, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan, the Ford Foundation and Slack Inc.