About ACSP

At Atlanta Community Support Project (ACSP), we are sourcing the struggle against poverty and mass criminalization through community-based research and resource development. As directly-impacted abolitionists, our theory of change lies in the confidence that we can interrupt the power dynamic that sustains racist oppression by ensuring our people have what they need to advocate individually and collectively, while incarcerated and after, in the courts, before administrative agencies, and through civic participation and conversations with those elected to represent us.

Among all the unique qualities we possess – activists, artists, writers, legal and policy folks, students, educators, family members, friends, neighbors – we are criminal system experts. Our work lies in dreaming out loud… of a post-othering world where we write the stories about us... where those who know the issues inform lawmakers throughout every step of the legislative processes... where lawyers, researchers, and clinicians don’t get to claim ‘expertise’ over our lives and then categorize, scrutinize, and medicalize us… where everyone has a first chance, harm is addressed in ways that restore and heal, and social and financial capital earmarked for our neighborhoods gets invested into infrastructures that actually advance public safety and community sustainability.

More than others, we understand our community needs and the required solutions, and we're here to work together to achieve them.

ACSP holds the following community values:

• We are people first. Yes, we’re all indoctrinated to use dehumanizing language to describe people impacted by the criminal system. We know that laws continue to employ these Jim Crow derivatives, and that some self-proclaimed ‘experts’ are unwilling to promote equity or even objectivity. That doesn’t make it right. Once we’ve had the language conversation – and we are always open to having it – ACSP will not tolerate anyone wielding intentional dehumanizing language against our community. We firmly believe that, in order to have important conversations, we have to enter them with each side seeing the other as people first.

• Nothing about us without us. Our comrades at Women on the Rise say this everywhere they go, and we stand with them. That's because stakeholder involvement in anything is commonsensical. When SEC rules are debated, the investment bankers are there. When property laws and pharmaceutical regulations are discussed, the real estate billionaires and drug kings send their lobbyists. If it involves making or changing rules or laws that affect our lives, we should be at the forefront. As history has taught us, repeatedly, things done for or to us threaten continued oppression.

• It’s all of us or none. AOUON is not just a nationwide organization to which we belong; it’s a state of mind. ACSP does not engage in or support campaigns or policy efforts which carve out, or make exceptions for, certain groups of us. We will not throw some of our people under the bus for the benefit of others. That’s why we reject ridiculous ‘violent/non-violent’ narratives and practices which further stigmatize those already facing the biggest barriers among us. This expressly includes people forced to register due to sex-related offenses and those convicted of a ‘seven deadly sins’ felony in Georgia. These discriminations were built by inflammatory, fear-driven marketing campaigns long debunked by tons of social science. Don’t believe everything you see on TV.  We will not be divided.

• We call it like we see it. Slavery is constitutionally protected and actively enforced in Georgia and a few other states. People who have been criminalized are exempt from privacy protections and defamation laws. Atlanta hates poor people (Devin Franklin, ACSP Board member, movement lawyer, and former public defender called that one). Some call us ‘returning citizens,’ yet citizens’ rights are withheld from us. The point is – strategizing on solutions requires us to be honest about the realities we are living, even and especially when others are not.

• We can’t do this alone. Systemic transformation requires the participation of everyone. That’s why ACSP partners with like-minded advocates, sister nonprofits, funders focused on justice in the Deep South, and attorneys willing to use their bar numbers to help move the needle. It’s why we have conversations with our adversaries. It’s why we engage and welcome the support of young people and students. To build a better future together, we need all y'all!