#nowreading
"The Welfare Marketplace: Privatization and Welfare Reform" by Mary Bryna Sanger.

Hello! I'm Stephen. Here's a real #intro:

I've been a lawyer for ~8 years. For 6 years I represented marginalized folks in Ohio's courts, mostly appeals. For the last 2 years I've worked in systems and data for public defenders. Now I live in NYC and work in the Bronx.

I work with #data, #ethicaltech, process/systems improvement, #policy, #communications, #cjreform, and where all of that intersects. Let me know if you want to talk about any of that! (Also into #maps, #scifi, #hiking, my cat)

Not sure how I stumbled on this letter from the editor of a student newspaper, but it's so great. A coach said the paper shouldn't exclusively cover games the team loses, and the editor basically responded "we'd have to see the team WIN a game to cover it." http://theranger.org/2015/03/23/we-are-a-newspaper-not-a-public-relations-firm/

"The nonprofit establishment or non-profit industrial complex (NPIC) also seeks out 'sexy' or 'fundable' issues to co-opt and exploit as these are ripe for the grant funding that they covet."
http://www.indigenousaction.org/accomplices-not-allies-abolishing-the-ally-industrial-complex/

“How the Push to Close Rikers Went from No New Jails to New Jails.” https://theappeal.org/how-the-push-to-close-rikers-went-from-no-jails-to-new-jails/

"Had a loss of comparable magnitude to the Universal fire occurred at a different cultural institution — say, the Metropolitan Museum of Art — there might have been wider awareness of the event, perhaps some form of accountability." https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/11/magazine/universal-fire-master-recordings.html

I am too midwestern to function and incredibly socially awkward, so grain of salt, but: I think it's slightly rude when someone says "how are you?" and I say "good, how about you?" and they don't respond.

‪What is a song that is in your all-time-favorite-songs pantheon but seems like nobody else ever talks about it?‬

‪Here’s one for me: Air France - “Collapsing at Your Doorstep”‬
‪https://youtu.be/IMATnqyVMZM‬

Not a bad start.

I have found a coffee shop slash record store near Penn Station in Baltimore, which is giving me white-guy-in-college nostalgia.

The presentation I gave today had a slide that just said "No amount of data science, IT wizardry, undergraduate interns, etc. can create reports from data that has not already been meaningfully collected." Trying to bring the truth to public defense managers.

Ok I did not understand how much of a disaster these scooters were until I saw them in Baltimore. They are just all over, no designated spots, just scattered.

Trains are very nice.

I am on a train going to Baltimore for a conference on community-oriented and holistic legal defense. I will be presenting on systems and process thinking for tech problem solving, particularly around unfunded mandates for increased data collection. It is (hopefully!) more interesting than it sounds.

Over on Twitter a friend was trying to figure out how a small amusement park in Columbus, Ohio was laid out in 1909, and I did some investigation, resulting in this tweet. I love this sort of thing, superimposing old maps on new, finding stories in the ground, finding history in mundane strip malls that we just don't think about very often. https://twitter.com/makingarecord/status/1134106787492368384