Legal Aid at Work has some wonderful news to share! This week, we welcome Katie Dixon to the organization. Katie Dixon will be joining us as the Fair Chance Community Rights Organizer. As such, she will engage in advocacy on behalf of and with formerly incarcerated job seekers across the state of California. In California, approximately 7 million people face barriers to accessing jobs because of their criminal records.
“The opportunity to work as Fair Chance Community Rights Organizer, with Legal Aid at Work, is an honor. As a formerly incarcerated person, who has experienced the effects, and knows the importance of Fair Chance policies, I see this as the perfect opportunity to give back to my community. I also accept it as duty to uplift people like myself, to exercise their rights, understand the law, and build power amongst formerly incarcerated people,” Katie says.
Katie comes to us with years of professional and personal, lived experiences that will be essential to her work with Legal Aid at Work. Her full bio is below.
Katie Dixon recently completed a year-long Policy Fellowship with Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, an organization that organizes individuals, families and communities impacted by the U.S. carceral system, advocates for the release of incarcerated people, and fights to restore human and civil rights for all Formerly Incarcerated People (FIP). Katie is also a Policy Outreach Leader, for Just Cities / Dellums Institute for Social Justice. Since graduating from Delancey Street Foundations’ Life-Learning Academy (a two year program for FIP), in 2014, Katie has been active in supporting communities through the Bay Area. Katie is a proud alumni of the Young Women’s Freedom Center, where system impacted girls are transformed into leaders; she continues to work closely with the San Francisco Adult Probation Department, Reentry Division, which focuses on job placement for people on SF probation. Katie is a member of ALL OF US OR NONE (AOUON), the driving force behind the nations’ Ban the Box movement (AOUON is a national movement led by FIP, founded back in 2003). Katie is also a member of the League of Women Voters Oakland Chapter, which has a Reentry component.
We are absolutely thrilled to have Katie join us in this important work to ensure that a criminal record is not a life sentence to poverty, discrimination, and unemployment!