Creative Justice is an arts-based, healing engaged space informed by the vision and needs of youth impacted by systemic and institutional oppression. CJ builds community with youth and young adults impacted by the criminal legal and child welfare systems facilitating arts-based, healing-engaged educational and culturally responsive spaces; disrupting the harm caused by oppression, healing trauma and addressing root causes by offering positive affirming opportunities and community connections; and advocating with systems-impacted young people to remain in the community with the supports necessary to thrive.

While the number of youth incarcerated in the King County Youth Detention Center has decreased, racial disparities still persist. In 2014, nearly 75% of youth held in juvenile detention in King County were youth of color. 4Culture and a cohort of community partners developed Creative Justice as an innovative arts-based approach to ending racial disproportionality and youth incarceration. Creative Justice is fiscally sponsored by Rainier Valley Corps.

CREATIVE JUSTICE USES ART AS A VEHICLE TO:

• Heal and transform

• Prepare young people to be leaders in community

• Amplify youth voice as a source of community transformation

• Promote teamwork, collaboration, and community engagement

• Help lift up the power of young people of color, youth from low-income families, and LGBTQIA+ youth

• Increase youth and community understanding of the histories and conditions that create racism, classism, sexism, heterosexism, homophobia, transphobia, and other forms of oppression

• Enhance skills that help young people reflect on their social position, choices, and personal power so they can stay out of jail

This is our entry-level arts program.  Many youth who are new referrals start by completing at least one session in the Creative Justice BASE program. Youth self-select into an art practice and attend two 2-hour classes per a week with a master teaching artist. They are compensated $60-90 per week, art supplies are provided, and they are provided with various basic needs support such as grocery cards, personal items, rental and transportation support as needed. After completing one 10-12 week session with us a youth can opt to participate in another session and/or apply to join the Youth Leadership Board, Youth Consortium, Makerspace and/or the Peer Mentor Artist training program.

Experienced mentor artists lead four 8-12 week intensive project sessions per year in a variety  of disciplines. During the sessions, participants meet twice a week, for two hours, to dialogue,  create and share a meal.    

Sessions include:  

∙ Artistic skill building with an emphasis on social practice; 

∙ Discussion and learning rooted in principles of anti-racism and social justice;  ∙ Individual and collaborative creative work; and 

∙ Opportunities to give and receive feedback.  

In exchange for their creative work, youth receive community service credit and stipends that  incentivize participation while helping to pay court fines and other expenses. Family members  are engaged in the projects in various ways, including participation in hands-on activities. At the end of each session, youth lead and produce community-based events where they share  their creativity, vision, and new abilities.

We strive to honor the leadership and agency of youth and young adults. The Youth Leadership Board (YLB) is composed of youth and young adults who have been or currently are enrolled in Creative Justice. They play a key role in organizational strategy, hiring of directors, program planning, and training for staff and volunteers.

Healing happens in relationships. Through an arts-based healing circle practice youth do the challenging and necessary work of healing and accountability. In Fall of 2021 three of our youth were trained in the Collective Justice HEAL curriculum in preparation to launch CJ arts-based healing circles. Twelve (12) Creative Justice youth participate in these peer-led circles. The circles  are 9 months long with 12 participants meeting twice weekly for two to three hours each circle. All facilitators and participants are compensated and receive basic needs support such as rental and transportation assistance and grocery gift cards as needed.

Makerspace facilitates opportunities for youth and young adults to grow their leadership and entrepreneurial skills through understanding and building creative economies. Thriving as an artist, creative or entrepreneur can be challenging, but with the support of community mentors participants establish healthier relationships with money and labor and learn how to grow their own culturally rooted and community connected small businesses. Makerspace affirms the cultural, individual, and communal knowledge of participants, supports positive identity development, and encourages participants to leverage their ingenuity to develop creative solutions for addressing social issues, creating thriving spaces and developing products that meet individual and community needs.

The Youth Consortium (YC) was founded by a coalition of organizations including Creative Justice, Rainier Beach Action Coalition and Community Passageways. The Youth Consortium is a youth-directed program that focuses on advocacy and base building in our communities.  YC members are compensated for their time and organizing. They meet two (2) times per a week for 2-hours and occasionally host events. Twice yearly the YC produces a zine as a part of the Inside-Out Project which focuses on telling stories and amplifying the voices of currently incarcerated peoples. Initially, the Inside-Out Project focused on amplifying the voices of peoples who were declined to adult court and incarcerated as children in adult facilities. The YC is an advocacy focused coalition that aims to uplift and amplify the visions and solutions of Black, Indigenous, Youth of Color in the south end of Seattle and our loved ones incarcerated in the State of Washington.

Through partnerships with Converge Media, Real Change and King County young people are building out “for us, by us” media and communications tools and strategies. Currently, Creative Justice youth operate a podcast called “Recess” that centers youth voices. Youth play a crucial role in identifying topics and guests for the podcast. Additionally, monthly a Creative Justice participant writes a monthly column for Real Change on current events and issues that matter most to them. Lastly, we are partnering with our youth leaders and King County Public Health to co-design a youth-led public health focused communications initiative that speaks to substance use in a way that responds to the unique interests and needs of youth and young adults in King County.

Creative Cafe is a partnership between Black Power Unlimited (BPU) and Creative Justice (CJ). Located on the first floor of Washington Hall in the Central District of Seattle, Creative Cafe employs youth and young adults who have participated in Creative Justice as Creative Cafe Interns. Interns participate in our barista training program, a workers rights curriculum and learn how to cultivate community spaces that focus on connections, healing, arts and culture, and strengthening accountable relationships. The Creative Cafe is open Monday-Friday 7am-3pm and by request for space rentals and community partners.

Since our inception, Creative Justice has intended for the organization to in the future be led by former participants. We are at present a “for us, by us” organization, but we know that can go deeper. In order to achieve this vision we are intentionally focused on developing leadership from within through The Fellowship, which employs former participants who have aged out in full-time, benefitted roles. Fellows work closely with program directors and mentor artists deeply learning the various roles and responsibilities necessary to run the organization. They are essential members of the Creative Justice team and we are excited to build out The Fellowship with our first cohort (July 2023 to June 2025).

CJ’s Health & Wellness program is led by Shelagh Brown (Health and Wellness Director), Veronica Johanson-Faison (Community Care Director) and Coach/Artist Darnel Hill. The program provides monthly H&W workshops focused on issues and needs identified by CJ youth (mental health, substance use, know your rights, relationships and boundaries, financial wellness, etc.) and weekly community fitness and wellness training sessions with Darnel Hill where participants learn boxing fundamentals and basic health and fitness tools to help inform their personal health, wellness and fitness journeys.

We know that we must do more than dismantle the criminal legal system. We must dismantle harmful systems/institutions and transform material conditions. Changing material conditions starts first with basic needs. This is one of the most important ways in which we keep each other safe by ensuring we are fed, clothed, sheltered, have access to health care, education, supportive community, and income. All CJ participants receive some form of financial compensation for their participation and have access to basic needs support such as rental and transportation assistance, grocery gift cards, and the CJ pantry. We are also currently providing low-barrier free behavioral healthcare for those who request it.

The Peer Mentor Artist Training Program (PMATP) is an opportunity for Creative Justice youth who have an interest in becoming arts and culture workers to hone their skills and build their resumes. PMATP is available to youth who have demonstrated a commitment and deep interest in becoming a professional arts and cultural worker. They are compensated at the same level as our Master Mentor Artists at $50 per an hour working for 5-8 hours per a week. The goal of the PMATP is to support young arts and cultural workers in developing the arts and education skills necessary to become a master teaching artist and thrive off their craft.

Creative Justice focuses on providing space that allows systems impacted youth to take a moment and envision what future they want to build. When battling systemic-oppression of any kind it is extremely difficult to focus on anything other than immediate needs. Creative Justice partners with local businesses, creatives, restaurants, and values-aligning organizations who agree the youth have powerful ideas, stories, opinions, and impactful art which deserves highlighting and support.

Social Practice, sometimes called socially-engaged art, uses public engagement as a primary  medium. It emerged out of the long history of community arts.  

Social Practice art focuses on the interaction between the audience, social systems, and the  artist. The social interaction inspires, drives, or, in some instances, completes the project.  Although projects may incorporate traditional studio media, they are realized in a variety of  visual or social forms such as performance, social activism, or mobilizing communities toward a  common goal. Social Practice honors community arts’ value that art is an experience to be  shared rather than a commodity to be consumed or collected.

Attorneys, judges, juvenile probation counselors, social workers, community or family members, youth advocates, youth themselves, and schools refer young people to Creative Justice. Youth then choose whether or not to participate. 

Creative Justice acknowledges that the court process compounds existing systemic burdens, such as  poverty and racism, with fines and other requirements. Rather than penalizing youth for being late or missing a class, Creative Justice focuses on using incentives like stipends, relationships  with mentor artists, and content relevant to their lives to keep participants engaged.

Yes, it can. Art makes us think and it feeds our spirit. Having a creative practice has been  shown to build critical skills and abilities such as communication, personal expression, self efficacy, persistence, teamwork and collaboration, community engagement, relationship  development and maintenance, accountability, internalized motivation to succeed, increased  civic participation and leadership (Catterall, 2009; Heath, 1999; Rabkin & Redmond, 2006;  Burton, Horowitz, &Ables, 1999).  

Art is also a conduit toward a more just world. By responding to personal and social issues  through the creative process, youth and mentor artists engaged in Creative Justice articulate  both the identity and potential of their communities.

Creative Justice offers an alternative to incarceration for young people in King County. The program works to increase their understanding of the root causes of incarceration, like systemic racial bias and other forms of oppression, while simultaneously strengthening the protective factors and pro-social behaviors that allow us all to make positive life choices. In this way, Creative Justice partners with systems impacted youth and young adults to push for transformative system changes and assist them in developing skills to more healthily navigate the world in which we currently live.

Mentor Artist applications are accepted on a rolling basis throughout the program year and can change quarterly. They are selected via a series of interviews with both directors and board members of the Youth Leadership Board present.

Youth advocates and arts-based social justice organizations helped shape the initial Creative Justice model and continue to support the program as advisors and trainers. Youth and adult advisory groups guide development and implementation.  

The Youth Advisory Group consists of members of existing youth leadership entities: Youth  Undoing Institutional Racism (YUIR) and King County Youth Advisory Council (KCYAC). Some  representatives have been previously incarcerated or involved with the court.    

The Adult Advisory Group consists of 14 stakeholders:  

JoeAnne Taylor, Juvenile Probation Counselor Supervisor, King County  

Diane Korf, Juvenile Probation Counselor, King County  

Wesley Saint Clair, Chief Juvenile Judge, King County  

Marcel Purnell, Youth Undoing Institutional Racism  

Omana Imani, Program Director, Arts Corps  

Claire Thornton, Prosecuting Attorney, King County  

Katherine Hurley, Attorney, Public Defender Association  

Lara Davis, Arts Education Manager, City of Seattle Office of Arts & Culture

Greg Garcia, Executive Director, WAPI Community Services 

Jill Patnode, Director, Dropout Intervention and Re-engagement Services

Puget Sound  Educational Service District  

Caedmon Cahill, Staff Attorney, Team Child  

Sharon Williams, Managing Director, Central District Forum for Arts and Ideas  

Andre Franklin, Garfield Community Center Manager, City of Seattle Parks and Recreation

The Community Advisory Board (CAB) is composed of community members who are arts and culture workers, have been impacted by systemic oppression and/or the criminal punishment system, and share our abolitionist vision. They support in organizational strategy, fundraising, and community engagement.

Current Community Advisory Board members:

Ebo Barton

Janet Galore

Heidi Jackson

4Culture is King County’s designated cultural service provider. Public Art 4Culture commissions  contemporary art and experiences, bringing artists' work and thinking to the community. The building of the King County Children and Family Justice Center (CFJC) generated 1% for Art revenue. That funding was applied to a variety of art projects, including the commission of new architecturally-integrated and portable artworks, artist  residencies, and art experiences that promote engagement with youth and families. Among  those projects was Creative Justice. Additional funding came from a generous grant from the National Endowment for the Arts.  4 Culture continues to support Creative Justice through sustained support grants and other funding.

Creative Justice receives funding from public and private sources including (in alphabetical order):

Borealis Philanthropy, City of Seattle Department of Education and Early Learning, City of Seattle Equitable Communities Initiative, City of Seattle Human Services Department, City of Seattle Office of Arts & Culture, Inatai, King County 4Culture, King County Best Starts for Kids, King County Restorative Community Pathways, Laird Norton Foundation, Marguerite Casey Foundation, Marie Lamfrom Charitable Foundation, Raikes Foundation, Seattle Foundation, Share Fund, Social Justice Fund, Threshold, Washington State Department of Commerce, Vitalogy Foundation, Satterberg Foundation.

Creative Justice is fiscally sponsored by RVC Seattle, a registered 501(c)3 organization whose goal is to cultivate leaders from within communities of color to strengthen the capacity of communities-of-color-led nonprofits.