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PRO-ACT Tackles Employment Discrimination
Published June 1, 2007
PRO-ACT’S Philadelphia Chapter Public Policy Committee (PCPPC) is facing head-on, laws that allow discriminatory hiring practices against people in recovery for alcohol and other drugs. Presently the PCPPC is reviewing statues that fail to go far enough to protect recovering persons from discriminatory hiring practices, and laws that have a direct and adverse affect on the drug/alcohol recovery community. The PCPPC’s goal is to have such laws in Pennsylvania amended.
A law that the committee has identified as falling short of protecting people in addiction recovery from discriminatory hiring practices is the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act (PHRA) of 1955, amended in 1996. After reviewing this act and listening to persons in recovery share their challenges, members of the PCPPC believe that even though the PHRA is well intentioned, it fails to fully remove discriminatory practices that result in barriers to employment for recovering persons.
The PCPPC is also reviewing the Pennsylvania Criminal History Records Information Act (CHRIA). CHRIA provides no method of either sealing or denying public access to records. It is possible that this may be causing employment, housing, and other decisions to be made on partial, irrelevant, and occasionally inaccurate information.
PCPPC also takes issue with laws that deny financial aid for higher education as well as housing opportunities to people in recovery who have drug-related convictions, in spite of sustained recovery and responsible social behaviors.
Currently the committee is in a research and information-gathering mode. However, the members anticipate that their efforts will not only open a dialogue with lawmakers, but the PCPPC hopes to become the catalyst for positive change.
Currently we’re only one small voice, so we welcome others who have an interest in becoming a Chapter Public Policy member. Learn how to advocate and become that voice for change. Join us for our next Public Policy Meeting.
This Journal entry submitted by Les Flippen, Chairperson, PRO-ACT Philadelphia Chapter Public Policy Committee.
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