Be READI. Public Defenders brace for 3-year Belonging, Racial Equity, Accountability, Diversity, and Inclusion Assessment. “Resilience through emotional acknowledgement” looms.

Beleaguered public defenders face an ordeal of struggle sessions as a for-profit three-person firm set forth its proposal in a September 11th document to the Division of Public Defender Services (DPDS).
Thought Partner Solutions pledges to align with DPDS’s “commitment to a more equitable and inclusive workplace.

The two-phase plan begins with an “Organizational Assessment ‘Acknowledgement.'” The implication is that members of the agency will be acknowledging bad things within it. The first phase will include a “Racial Equity Organizational Profile.” The agency is headed by a Black woman, TaShun Bowden-Lewis. Her failure to hire fill more than a dozen vacancies in the agency in more than a year as its leader will fit neatly in the accountability category.

Phase two will feature exploring cultural competence and “building resilience through emotional acknowledgement.” It will also include “operationalizing equity, managing organizational conflict, sharing power, implementing new practices, and sustaining the initiative.” An advance course in jargon is not included but appears essential.

The estimated cost “falls within the range of $50,000 to $150,000, subject to further refinement as we engage in detailed discussions about the project’s scale.” Thought Partner Solutions estimates its duration at 1-3 years. “Further refinement” may lead to an escalating price tag.

The proposal makes no mention of the agency’s mission: providing legal representation for people of little means who have been charged with a crime.

DPDS employs a $146,000 a year Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Daryl McGraw. The thicket of tasks Thought Partner Solutions sets out in its proposal sound like what he was hired to do.

The Thought Partner Solutions expenditure may have to wait until the Public Defender Services Commission determines if the agency’s growing swag budget can make room for other costs unrelated to achieving the best results for clients. Spending has become another minefield of conflict in the agency, as The Courant’s Ed Mahony reported in an alarming story of accusations of racism by Bowden-Lewis against commission chair, Richard Palmer.