Making Policy Public
Tuesday
February 9
2010

2009 Collaborators

Navigating juvenile justice
Designer: Danica Novgorodoff
Advocates: Dory Hack (Youth Justice Board) 

Keeping parks public
Designer: Amelia Irwin, Nicole Killian (Hot Sundae)
Advocate: Desiree Marshall (FIERCE)

The tomato supply chain
Designer: Alice Chung (Omnivore)
Advocates: Damara Luce (Coalition of Immokalee Workers and
Just Harvest USA)

Redistricting reform
Designer: Michael Gallagher, Sebastian Campos (We Have Photoshop)
Advocates: Justin Levitt, Erika Wood (The Brennan Center for Justice)

Public housing participation
Designer: Jeffrey Lai (Office of Jeff)
Advocates: Henry Serrano (Community Voices Heard)

To see last year's collaborators click here.

Navigating juvenile justice
Keeping parks public
The tomato supply chain
Redistricting reform
Public housing participation




Danica Novgorodoff

Danica Novgorodoff is a painter, comic book artist, writer and graphic designer who currently lives in Brooklyn, NY. As an art major, she received her B.A. from Yale University in 2002. Since 2005, she has worked as a book designer for Roaring Brook Press, a publisher of graphic novels and children’s books. Novgorodoff has self-published several comic books, and her graphic novels “Slow Storm” and “Refresh, Refresh” were published by First Second Books in 2008 and 2009.

Youth Justice Board

The Youth Justice Board is a leadership program that gives young people a voice in policies that affect their lives, and provides policymakers access to the insights of informed young people. Each year, a team of high-school-age youth from across New York City investigates a juvenile justice or public safety issue, formulates policy recommendations and works to implement its recommendations. The current Youth Justice Board seeks to expand and improve the City’s Alternatives to Detention (ATD) programs for young people charged with delinquencies. The Youth Justice Board is a project of the Center for Court Innovation and the Center for Courts and the Community.

Hot Sundae

Hot Sundae is 50% Amelia Irwin and 50% Nicole Killian. They met a year ago while working their design day job at Nickelodeon. After realizing they both had the same beliefs over Degrassi Junior High they decided to join forces to create a new super-powered design duo. Amelia had already been trained at Cranbrook Academy of Art and Nicole decided to do the same. 50% of Hot Sundae is from the trails of Appalachia and the other half is from the snow piles of Buffalo. 100% of them like kittens, ice cream, drawing, typography, and pizza. This amazing combination is now making awesomeness for clients and friends alike.

Desiree Marshall

Desireé Marshall is the Lead Organizer at FIERCE, a community organization for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and Questioning (LGBTQ) youth of color ages 13-24 in New York City. FIERCE is dedicated to building the leadership and power of LGBTQ youth of color, through direct-action campaigns, youth and leadership development, as well as various events that connect to the culture of our community. Desireé coordinates the development of FIERCE's campaign work along with member-leaders of the Campaign Steering Committee. She earned her Bachelor's Degree at Hofstra University in Anthropology and Philosophy. She is also a Spoken Word poet and makes a fierce batch of stuffed pasta shells.

Alice Chung

Alice Chung is a co-founding partner of Omnivore, a small studio with a voracious appetite for cultural- and cause-related work based bicoastally in Brooklyn and Portland. Before venturing into the world of design, she completed studies in biology and health/social behavior and, though perhaps a bit unconventional, has been able to ally those disciplines in her current work. She also teaches typography and intermediate design at Yale University School of Art.

Coalition of Immokalee Workers

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers is a community-based farmworker organization headquartered in Immokalee, Florida, with over 4,000 members. The CIW seeks modern working conditions for farmworkers and promotes their fair treatment in accordance with national and international labor standards. Among its accomplishments, the CIW has aided in the prosecution by the Department of Justice of six slavery operations and the liberation of well over 1,000 workers. The CIW uses creative methods to educate consumers about human rights abuses in the U.S. agriculture industry, the need for corporate social responsibility, and how consumers can help workers realize their social change goals. To date, the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food has won support for fundamental farm labor reforms from six retail food industry leaders – including Yum Brands, McDonald's, Burger King, Whole Foods Market, Subway, and Bon Appetit Management Company – with the goal of enlisting the market power of those companies to demand more humane labor standards from their Florida tomato suppliers.

We Have Photoshop

We Have Photoshop was born in New Haven, Connecticut in March 2007 and received an MFA from Yale School of Art a couple of months later. Before We Have Photoshop was born it was a magazine art director and senior lecturer in London; a book designer for university presses in Louisiana and North Carolina; and a designer of corporate literature in New York. In the short time since its birth it has been involved with museums in midtown Manhattan; colleges in Brooklyn, Philadelphia and Oslo; multiculturalists in northern Italy; architects and researchers in New Jersey; and artists in Chelsea and Brooklyn.

Justin Levitt

Justin Levitt is counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, focusing on redistricting, election administration, and other voting rights concerns. His work has included thorough research into the most pressing issues of election law and practice; publication of extensive studies and reports; assistance to federal and state administrative and legislative bodies with responsibility over elections; participation as amicus curiae in significant cases around the country; and litigation, when necessary, as counsel for parties seeking to compel states to comply with their obligations under federal law and the Constitution. Mr. Levitt is the author or co-author of articles in both law reviews and peer-reviewed publications, and has also written many shorter commentaries for a more public audience. His Brennan Center monographs, including A Citizen’s Guide to Redistricting (2008), The Truth About Voter Fraud (2007), and Making the List (2006), have been cited extensively in the courts and in the media. Mr. Levitt has served in various capacities for several presidential campaigns, including most recently as the National Voter Protection Counsel, helping to run an unprecedented effort ensuring that tens of millions of citizens could vote and have those votes counted. He has also worked for a number of different civil rights and nonprofit voter engagement organizations, including as in-house counsel to one of the nation’s largest voter registration and mobilization efforts.

Erika Wood

Erika L. Wood is the Deputy Director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice where she directs the Right to Vote project and works on redistricting reform as part of the Center’s Government Accountability project. Ms. Wood has designed and launched major reform campaigns around the country, provides legal counsel and strategic guidance to advocates, legislators and policymakers nationwide and created the Brennan Center Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice Advisory Council as well as the Center’s Communities of Faith Initiative. She has authored several groundbreaking reports, numerous articles and is a frequent speaker and commentator on voting rights, criminal justice reform and racial justice issues. Ms. Wood is an Adjunct Professor at NYU School of Law where she teaches a public policy advocacy clinic.

Jeff Lai

Jeffrey Lai set up his graphic design studio, Office of Jeff, in 2004. Office of Jeff works with a wide-range of clients, from cultural non-profits to large international consortiums. The office works across various media: books, identities, advertising, websites, posters, exhibition design, video and motion graphics. Jeffrey has taught at the Pratt Institute and the Rhode Island School of Design.

Community Voices Heard

Community Voices Heard (CVH) is a membership-based community group that works to engage low-income families in organizing campaigns to influence policy that affects their families and their communities. CVH was started in 1994 by women on public assistance who wanted to fight to have their voices included in the national debate on welfare reform. Since then, the organization has grown to include various policy campaigns in New York City as well as expanding to three chapters in Westchester, Orange and Dutchess Counties. CVH places priority on leadership development, policy education, direct action, participatory research and community outreach to build the tools necessary to engage community members and win on policy issues. The current issue campaigns are Welfare/Workforce; Sustainable Communities; Public Housing; and The Voter Power Project.