By Asia Fields
When the MacArthur Foundation called Lisa Daugaard to tell her she’d been selected for a prestigious fellowship, she didn’t answer. Daugaard thought the calls were coming from a telemarketer, and she had a lot on her mind. Police were increasingly referring people accused of low-level crimes to Seattle’s Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) program, so they could connect with services instead of being sent to jail. But Daugaard worried funding for the program wasn’t keeping up. “I thought, ‘I don’t know if I can do this. This may be just too difficult,’” Daugaard said. So when she finally answered a call from the foundation a few weeks ago and learned it was recognizing her police-reform efforts, she said it felt “providential.”
Source: JusticeCenter