Our League, LWV Highland Park/Highwood, together with LWV Deerfield Area, LWV Northwest Lake County and the LWV Lake County Inter-League Organization had close to 50 people who zoomed in for the two Criminal Justice consensus meetings on January 7th and January 12th, 2021. 

The study had been broken down into 14 different subtopics, seven presented and discussed at each meeting. Members had prepared for the consensus meetings by watching six experts from various Criminal Justice fields talk about their experiences and disseminate their knowledge.  Background information had been sent out to the membership. At each consensus meeting, a 5-minute summary of the pros and cons for each subtopic question was presented by someone from the committee who had studied that topic. After the presentations, each League had their own breakout room to discuss the questions and come to their own consensus on each subtopic.   There were approximately 15 of our League members participating in the HP/HWD breakout room led by Judy Miller.

These meetings ended our local League’s involvement with this LWV Illinois study. Seventeen members from all three Leagues had worked on this, including Elaine Adler, Rose Feder, Carole Kohn, and Judy Miller from our League. For the next step, the State League will consolidate the results from all the Leagues in Illinois to produce a renewed position, allowing us to engage more fully in criminal justice advocacy.