Employers Are Still Avoiding Former Inmates
DeVaughn Bell had been home in Washington, D.C., from federal prison for only one month, and he’d gotten interviews for several jobs. But none of them stuck. He’d have a positive interview—in one case, he even received an offer and a start date—and then someone would tell him the company couldn’t move forward with him. “It was kind of discouraging,” Bell says, “because I was coming home thinking, Okay, it’s going to be better now.” He suspected the employers’ sudden lack of interest was because of his criminal background.
Over the past two decades, the federal government, 35 states, and more than 150 cities, including the District of Columbia, have created “ban the box” policies, which restrict when an employer can ask a job applicant about his criminal history. D.C. passed its ban-the-box law, known as the Fair Criminal Record Screening Amendment Act (FCRSA), in 2014, while Bell was incarcerated. Under that law, employers in the district must delay questions about criminal history until after they’ve made a conditional offer of employment. Then they can ask about criminal convictions—not about charges or arrests. At that point, if an employer retracts an offer, it has to be for a “legitimate business reason,” based on the frequency and seriousness of
