Bill Summary
The Protect Black Women and Girls Act of 2020 is a proposed bill to establish an Interagency Task Force to examine the conditions and experiences of Black women and girls in various aspects of society, such as education, economic development, healthcare, and justice and civil rights. The bill also calls for a study to be conducted by the United States Commission on Civil Rights on issues impacting Black women and girls, and provides recommendations for policies, programs, and incentives to improve outcomes for this demographic. The bill aims to address systemic issues such as discrimination and bias based on race and sex, and provide support and resources to mitigate harm and ensure accountability. It also authorizes funding for the implementation of the bill's provisions.
Possible Impacts
1. This legislation could result in the creation of community-led support programs for Black school-age girls, providing them with access to social and emotional learning programs, mental health services, and educational resources. This could positively impact the well-being and academic success of Black girls.
2. The Task Force established by this legislation could recommend programs and incentives for supporting Black women in the workforce, such as vocational training, entrepreneurship programs, and career mentorship. This could help address the economic disparities faced by Black women and increase their opportunities for sustainable employment.
3. The study conducted by the United States Commission on Civil Rights on issues impacting Black women and girls could bring awareness to the disproportionate rates of incarceration, violence, and homelessness faced by Black women and girls. This could lead to policy changes and improvements in services for these individuals.
[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 8196 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
116th CONGRESS
2d Session
H. R. 8196
To establish an Interagency Task Force to examine the conditions and
experiences of Black women and girls in education, economic
development, healthcare, labor and employment, housing, justice and
civil rights, to promote community-based methods for mitigating and
addressing harm and ensuring accountability, and to study societal
effects on Black women and girls, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
September 11, 2020
Ms. Kelly of Illinois (for herself, Mr. Hurd of Texas, Mrs. Watson
Coleman, Ms. Clarke of New York, Ms. Bass, and Mr. Fitzpatrick)
introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on
the Judiciary, and in addition to the Committees on Education and
Labor, Energy and Commerce, and Financial Services, for a period to be
subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration
of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee
concerned
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To establish an Interagency Task Force to examine the conditions and
experiences of Black women and girls in education, economic
development, healthcare, labor and employment, housing, justice and
civil rights, to promote community-based methods for mitigating and
addressing harm and ensuring accountability, and to study societal
effects on Black women and girls, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Protect Black Women and Girls Act of
2020''.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress finds as follows:
(1) The United States Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR)
advises Congress, as well as the President and the American
public, on ``discrimination or denials of equal protection of
the laws under the Constitution of the United States because of
color, race, religion, sex, age, disability, or national
origin, or in the administration of justice''.
(2) The USCCR routinely has difficulties collecting
information from Federal agencies despite having the power to
take depositions, issue interrogatories and subpoenas, and
broad authority language for the collection of information from
Federal agencies.
(3) The activities mandated herein for the USCCR are
explicitly authorized by section 3 of the Civil Rights
Commission Act of 1983 (42 U.S.C. 1975a).
(4) An interagency task force is a task force organized in
collaboration with two or more Federal agencies, using
government-wide resources, and expertise to--
(A) examine a particular problem, issue, or event;
(B) discuss strategies as a collective group to
address such problem, issue, or event;
(C) identify programs, policies, and funding; and
(D) make recommendations for changes in public
policy.
(5) Implicit bias on the basis of race is experienced by
all Black people, and demonstrated more clearly, in the
troubling conditions for Black women and girls in our school
discipline policies and the connections to the school-to-prison
pipeline for children of color with disabilities.
(6) Black girls are suspended and expelled from school at
rates that exceed other girls and all other boys except Black
boys.
(7) In studying the conditions of confinement for women in
prison, Black women are admitted to prison at 3.9 times the
rate of White women.
(8) Black women and girls are individuals who identify as a
woman, female, or femme.
SEC. 3. INTERAGENCY TASK FORCE ON BLACK WOMEN AND GIRLS.
(a) Establishment.--Not later than 180 days after the date of
enactment of this Act, the Attorney General, in consultation with the
Secretary of Health and Human Services, shall establish an Interagency
Task Force on Black women and girls (referred to in this Act as the
``Task Force'') to carry out the purposes and duties described in
subsections (c) and (d), in compliance with requirements and
restrictions under law, as applicable, including those prohibiting
discrimination on the basis of race and sex.
(b) Membership.--The Task Force shall consist of members appointed
as follows:
(1) The head of each of the following agencies shall
appoint at least one officer or employee, but no more than two,
from a relevant office of the following:
(A) The Department of Health and Human Services.
(B) The Department of Education.
(C) The Department of Labor.
(D) The National Institutes of Health.
(E) The Department of Justice.
(F) The Department of Housing and Urban
Development.
(2) The Attorney General shall appoint the following:
(A) One officer or employee of the Federal Public
Defenders.
(B) Two representatives of community-based
organizations that have expertise working on culturally
specific issues unique to the needs of Black women and
girls.
(3) The term of a member of the Task Force shall be 4
years, and they shall be eligible for consecutive reappointment
by the head of their respective agency or the Attorney General.
(c) Purpose.--The purpose of the Task Force is to examine the
conditions and experiences of Black women and girls, to identify and
assess the efficacy of policies and programs of Federal, State, and
local governments designed to improve outcomes for Black women and
girls, and to make recommendations to improve such policies and
programs as necessary.
(d) Duties.--The duties of the Task Force are as follows:
(1) Education.--The Task Force shall identify and recommend
programs, policies, and incentives for adoption by Federal,
State, or local governments with respect to the following:
(A) Community-led educational and support programs
for Black school-age girls, which shall include the
following:
(i) Social and emotional learning programs
offered in elementary and secondary schools to
children in grades 7 through 12, including--
(I) affinity spaces for
particularly impacted students; and
(II) facilitators trained in
identity-based dialogue to attend to
such an affinity space or social and
emotional learning program.
(ii) Support for school-age girls who have
a parent or guardian who is incarcerated or has
a substance use disorder.
(iii) Support for a college scholarship
fund and programs to increase access to post-
secondary education for children of
incarcerated parents.
(iv) Classroom and after school empowerment
programs for Black girls.
(v) Community-led civic engagement and
community organizing education.
(vi) Classroom and community-led art,
theater, and STEM learning centers.
(vii) School-based and community-led
programs to eliminate the detention and
incarceration of school-aged children.
(viii) Household access to school-based
communication technologies.
(ix) School-based or community-based
restorative justice programs to address
expulsion of girls from school.
(x) Curriculum, tutoring, and activities
support for homeschooling and virtual learning
families.
(B) Community-led educational programs for Black
women, including providing household access to
information and communication technologies to narrow
the digital divide and enhance access to higher
education.
(C) School-based and neighborhood restorative and
transformative justice curriculums and spaces.
(2) Economic development.--The Task Force shall identify
and recommend programs, policies, and incentives for adoption
by Federal, State, or local governments with respect to the
following:
(A) Pre-apprenticeship and career exploration
programs for careers as skilled building tradeswomen.
(B) Programs that award not less than 10 percent of
their yearly and multi-year contract dollars to Black
women-owned businesses on an annual basis.
(C) Entrepreneurship and cooperative business
training for Black women.
(D) Incidental support for low income Black women
workers.
(E) Career mentorship for Black women.
(F) Support for older Black women workers to enter
the workforce.
(G) Support for Black women who leave the workforce
to care for a dependent (such as an elderly relative or
child) to re-enter the workforce after a significant
absence.
(H) Increase in sustainable employment for women
headed households.
(I) Limitation of barriers to occupational
licensure for Black women.
(J) Establishment of vocational training and career
technical education.
(3) Healthcare.--The Task Force shall identify and
recommend programs, policies, and incentives for adoption by
Federal, State, or local governments with respect to the
following:
(A) Developing a study of the health, including the
mental health, of Black women and girls.
(B) Programs to improve maternal health and infant
mortality outcomes for Black mothers.
(C) Neighborhood-based, on demand mental health and
trauma services.
(D) Gender-responsive domestic and interpersonal
violence responders.
(E) Local neighborhood safe houses.
(F) Long-term, on demand, substance use disorder
treatment.
(G) Neighborhood-based emergency response teams for
women and girls.
(H) Access to comprehensive well-women care for
Black women and girls, including local testing for
mammograms, papsmears, and other medical testing.
(I) Local neighborhood COVID-19 testing.
(4) Justice and civil rights.--The Task Force shall
identify and recommend programs, policies, and incentives for
adoption by Federal, State, or local governments with respect
to the following:
(A) Reentry assistance and reunification planning
and community-based programming for women victims of
the war on drugs, sexual or domestic violence, mental
illness, or substance abuse.
(B) Programs for Black women and girls that promote
the treatment of underlying problems instead of
incarceration, including the expansion of the use of
parole and diversion programs and preventing the
incarceration of mothers who are primary caretakers of
minor children.
(C) Access to legal assistance provided by the
Office on Violence Against Women of the Department of
Justice for child custody and parental termination
proceedings.
(D) Funding that enables communities to reimagine
community-based programming.
(E) Support for formerly incarcerated Black women,
in collaboration with community-led organizations.
(F) Permitting formerly incarcerated and convicted
women (not including incarceration or convictions for
violent offenses, human trafficking, or sex offenses)
to be eligible to serve as a foster parent.
(G) Judicial discretion in sentencing and
procedures for resentencing.
(H) Examination of policies to reform and limit
laws requiring mandatory minimum sentences.
(I) Examination of vacatur and expungement laws for
criminal offenses committed by victims of human and sex
trafficking.
(5) Housing.--The Task Force shall identify and recommend
programs, policies, and incentives for adoption by Federal,
State, or local governments with respect to the following:
(A) Increasing access to the following:
(i) Permanent and transitional housing for
women with children, formerly incarcerated
women, women with disabilities, and elderly
women.
(ii) Legal representation for women with
children and the elderly facing eviction.
(iii) Homeownership assistance funds for
Black women.
(B) Increasing accessibility and availability of
long-term neighborhood transitional and permanent
supportive housing for Black women reentering the
community following incarceration.
(e) Report to Congress.--Not later than 180 days after the date of
the enactment of this Act, and annually thereafter, the Task Force
shall submit to Congress a report on--
(1) the activities conducted under this section; and
(2) the activities conducted under this section that are
ongoing or are in continuation of existing Federal programs,
including information on additional work undertaken in response
to duties of the Task Force under subsection (d).
(f) Recommendations.--Not later than two years after the date of
enactment of this Act, and annually thereafter, the Task Force shall
submit to Congress, the President, and to each chief executive of a
State or local government recommendations on policies, practices,
programs, and incentives that may be adopted to improve outcomes for
Black women and girls.
SEC. 4. UNITED STATES COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS REPORT ON ISSUES
IMPACTING BLACK WOMEN AND GIRLS.
(a) Duties.--Not later than one year after the date of enactment of
this Act, and annually thereafter, the United States Commission on
Civil Rights shall conduct a comprehensive study and collect data with
respect to the effects on Black women and girls of the following:
(1) The lack of contract opportunities with the Federal
Government, for Black women.
(2) The wage gap and pay equity for Black women in
comparison to other individuals.
(3) The high maternal mortality rate and the steps needed
to reduce such rate.
(4) The high infant mortality rate of Black girls.
(5) The impact of screening for breast cancer at an earlier
age than 40 years of age for Black women.
(6) The school-to-prison pipeline and its impact on Black
women and girls.
(7) Housing stability, homelessness, and access to
affordable rental housing and home loans for Black women.
(8) The prevalence and rate of violence against Black women
and girls, including Black transgender women and girls, and the
effect of prevention strategies, barriers to service, and
increased lethality for these individuals.
(9) Excessive use of force by law enforcement, including
where death results, against Black women and girls, including
Black transgender women and girls.
(10) The over-incarceration of Black women and girls,
including Black transgender women and girls, in the juvenile
and adult justice system.
(11) Restoring Federal parole.
(12) Establishing a moratorium on building new women's
prisons or jails.
(13) Ending contracts for private prisons and electronic
monitoring.
(14) Repealing of the Adoption Safe Families Act of 1997
(Public Law 105-89; 111 Stat. 2115).
(15) Repealing any policy or law that creates barriers to
housing or precludes formerly incarcerated people from living
with family members in public or private housing.
(16) Neighborhood family reunification support.
(17) The high rate of sex trafficking of Black women and
girls, and the impact of State vacatur and expungement laws for
victims of human and sex trafficking.
(18) Any additional items described in section 3(d) that
the Commission determines appropriate.
(b) Report.--Not later than one year after the date of the
enactment of this Act, and annually thereafter, the United States
Commission on Civil Rights shall submit to Congress, the President, and
make publicly available online, a report outlining the Commission's
activities and findings under subsection (a).
(c) Information Sharing.--All relevant entities of the United
States Government, including the Department of Justice, the Department
of Health and Human Services, the Department of Education, the
Department of Labor, and the National Institutes of Health, shall
provide information to the United States Commission on Civil Rights in
order for the Commission to carry out its duties under this section.
SEC. 5. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS.
There is authorized to be appropriated such sums as may be
necessary to carry out the provisions of this Act.
<all>