Brooklyn Community Bail Fund DBA Envision Freedom Fund
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Mission Statement
Envision Freedom Fund works alongside impacted communities to dismantle the oppressive and interconnected criminal legal and immigration systems.
About This Cause
With freedom as our guiding principle, we invest in innovative campaigns and programs that aim to win long-term, transformative change, while meeting the urgent needs of community members in the present. Our work has always coupled a necessary intervention – freeing people from detention today – with advocacy and public education to achieve radical systems change – freedom for all people. With this mandate as our grounding, we changed our name to Envision Freedom Fund (formerly Brooklyn Community Bail Fund) in 2021 to ensure our public identity aligns more closely with our mission and vision. Founded in 2015 as the Brooklyn Community Bail Fund (BCBF), we have been at the forefront of the fight to end money bail and pretrial detention. Initially paying bail just in Brooklyn, we expanded to serve individuals across New York City, becoming the largest community bail fund in the country. In less than five years we freed nearly 5,000 people from jail, sparing them from the devastating consequences of pretrial detention and reuniting them with their families and communities so they could fight their cases from a position of freedom. Envision Freedom has a long history of strategic innovation and evolution. Observing the emergence of bail funds across the country, we envisioned a hub for funds to learn, grow, and make a collective impact. In 2016 BCBF launched and incubated the National Bail Fund Network until it became independent in 2018. During that period, we provided crucial operational and fiscal support to national bailouts. In 2018, with our partners VOCAL-NY and Five Boro Defenders, we co-launched Court Watch NYC, a volunteer-powered program that harnesses the power of New Yorkers to organize for transformative change of the criminal legal system. At the end of 2019, Court Watch NYC became a full fledged program of Envision Freedom Fund (then known as BCBF). In response to intensifying ICE raids and enforcement of immigration laws, in 2018 we began paying immigration bond. We know that freeing someone is an act of resistance against the criminal legal and immigration systems—intertwined systems of punishment that feed off each other to target and control low-income communities of color. Since then, we’ve spent over $6.7 million to free more than 700 of our immigrant neighbors. Just like our work paying bail, we harness our results and on-the-ground experiences to demonstrate that immigration bond and detention harm, rather than protect, our communities. Going forward, we will continue to work alongside BIPOC, immigrant and LGBTQ communities, directly impacted individuals, and allies to: - End pretrial and immigrant detention - Hold prosecutors, judges and law enforcement agencies, including ICE, accountable for egregious policies - Meet the urgent, material needs of community members caged by the criminal legal system and immigration enforcement regime. - Use cutting-edge approaches to free as many people as possible