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Removing criminal record box from job applications could offer new hope for ex-offenders
Asking job applicants to reveal criminal histories later in the hiring process could help former offenders break out of a lifelong cycle that leaves them struggling, according to speakers at a conference in Winston-Salem on Thursday.
Employers must balance their desire to provide job opportunities for former offenders with legitimate concerns to maintain workplace safety, Ken Carlson, a local employment lawyer, told the group.
“All members of our society are valuable, including those who have taken missteps,” he said.
Advocates want employers to delay asking applicants about whether they have criminal records until they interview them, so employers can consider an applicants’ qualifications without criminal convictions disqualifying the applicants, Carlson said. However, most employers conduct background checks on promising applicants.
About 130 people attended the forum, “Think Outside the Box: Addressing Workforce Challenges,” at the Hawthorne Inn and Conference Center.
Vivian Joiner, a co-owner of Sweet Potatoes Restaurant on Trade Street, said during the panel discussion that her business routinely hires people with criminal records.
“We are in a position to help,” Joiner said. “It gives people a sense of worth.”
A quarter of adults in the United States and 16 percent of North Carolinians have criminal records, said Joseph Hamby, the chamber’s manager of research and business growth. Their likelihood of returning to prison is concerning. Nationally, 67.5 percent of former offenders return to prison within three years of release. In North Carolina, 40 percent of former offenders return to prison within three years.
But once they have served their sentences, many former offenders cannot find jobs or housing, he said.
Supporters of “Ban the Box” say that pattern could be broken if employers removed the box on job applications for applicants to indicate if they have a criminal record.
More than 70 million Americans have criminal records, said speaker Robert Carragher, a senior state advisor for government affairs for the Society of Human Resource Managers.
Twenty-three states have banned the criminal-record box on public-sector job applications, and eight other states banned the box in private-sector job applications, he said. The city of Winston-Salem doesn’t ask job applicants about criminal backgrounds on applications.
The N.C. General Assembly hasn’t discussed the issue, Carragher said.
Judge Denise Hartsfield of Forsyth District Court, a panelist, said a conviction for a misdemeanor or low level felony should not impose a lifelong sentence.
“To not give people a second chance is to say that the criminal justice system is a joke,” Hartsfield said. “These people go through prison. Some employers want to continue to punish them by not giving them jobs.”
Evan Raleigh, the deputy director of the city’s business development department, said that the city’s Successful Outcomes After Release program (SOAR), provides jobs to former offenders in various city departments.
“Since they have committed their offense, they have felt that they are carrying around a scarlet letter,” Raleigh said. “We don’t want to separate or segregate them in any way.”
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