Cohort 2024
Gente Organizada
Uncovering Detention and Arrest Practices through a Justice Dashboard
Pomona, CA
In Pomona, California, young people of color ages 18 to 24 disproportionately interact with law enforcement. According to a 2021 report from Gente Organizada—a community-driven nonprofit in Pomona dedicated to preventing contact with the criminal legal system by empowering youth and families through intergenerational power and wellness initiatives—22.4 percent of juveniles and transitional-age youth arrested in Pomona are Black, even though Black residents make up only 5.6 percent of the city’s population.
With Catalyst Grant funding, Gente Organizada will develop a dashboard to educate local families about police detention and arrest practices that disproportionately affect Black and Latinx young adults in the community. Gente aims to promote data literacy by providing access to data and empowering community members with the skills and knowledge to interpret and use data from the dashboard to tell their own stories. By providing a clear, data-driven depiction of law enforcement encounters among Black and Latinx young adults, Gente will also inform the development and implementation of strategies to promote racial equity in criminal legal system processes in Pomona.
