BAG IT

FILM OVERVIEW

Directed by Suzan Berera and produced by Michelle Hill, Bag It premiered in 2010 and screened throughout the country for the next several years, winning 12 festival awards at both film industry and environmental film festivals.12 The official film synopsis:

Americans use 60,000 plastic bags every five minutes — single-use disposable bags that we mindlessly throw away. But where is “away?” Where do the bags and other plastics end up, and at what cost to our environment, marine life and human health? Bag It follows “everyman” Jeb Berrier as he navigates our plastic world. Jeb is not a radical environmentalist, but an average American who decides to take a closer look at our cultural love affair with plastics. Jeb’s journey in this documentary film starts with simple questions: Are plastic bags really necessary? What are plastic bags made from? What happens to plastic bags after they are discarded? Jeb looks beyond plastic bags and discovers that virtually everything in modern society-from baby bottles, to sports equipment, to dental sealants, to personal care products-is made with plastic or contains potentially harmful chemical additives used in the plastic-making process. When Jeb’s journey takes a personal twist, we see how our crazy-for-plastic world has finally caught up with us and what we can do about it. Today. Right now.13

THE JOURNEY: FROM FILM TO LOCAL POLICY ENGAGEMENT

It began with a local news story about a plastic bag reduction contest between two Colorado towns. Director Suzan Beraza was looking for a new film topic and said that “something about the reduction challenge made me want to learn more about plastic.”17 At first, Beraza said she was planning to make a short film about the contest itself, but “we came to see that there was a much bigger international story. We did some research and saw there had not been any big films about the topic. So we switched tacks and decided to make a feature length film.” The challenge was daunting:

102 billion plastic bags were used in the U.S. in 2009. These bags, even when properly disposed of, are easily windblown and often wind up in waterways or on the landscape, becoming eyesores and degrading soil and water quality as they break down into toxic bits. Their manufacture, transportation and disposal require large quantities of non-renewable resources and release equally large amounts of global-warming gases.18

The comedy aspect of the film is important because it’s really disarming, particularly for people who are already a little resistant about this kind of messaging.

JANE PATTON, MANAGING DIRECTOR OF THE PLASTIC POLLUTION COALITION

But Beraza’s research led her to the conclusion that “we can do something about plastic.”19 She said, “We didn’t know while we were making the film that we should be thinking about an engagement film the whole time.”20 The importance of a solutions-oriented approach became apparent as soon as they started screening Bag It. Producer Michele Maughan explained:

People would watch it and really wanted to know what they could do. So we had to go back and edit in a new ending in the film with ten things people could do… The more we showed it, the more we learned people were really asking us, how can we get involved? So we put together toolkits to show what others can do… [We] are more filmmakers than people running advocacy organizations, so we tried to connect people to the advocacy groups rather than becoming one ourselves.21

Those advocacy groups were in the middle of a years-long fight to reduce single-use plastic bags in states across the country. After the California legislature failed to pass a statewide plastic bag ban because of industry opposition, advocates focused on passing local bans in order to get enough momentum to bring it back and win at the state level.22 According to attorney and advocate Jennie Romer, who was involved with many Bag It screenings:

In most cases, the focus has to be on local communities because state laws won’t necessarily happen without the local laws. The state lawmakers need to see how the local laws already work in their states. Having those local laws in place really helps with the larger fights at the state level.23

Bag It was central to this effort because it explained the issue in an entertaining and motivating way. Jane Patton, managing director of Plastic Pollution Coalition, said:

The comedy aspect of the film is important because it’s really disarming, particularly for people who are already a little resistant about this kind of messaging. Comedy is really about “what do we all have in common if we’re human and we’re alive.”24

In fact, the first tool the Plastic Pollution Coalition recommended to start a campaign in local communities was to host a screening of Bag It.25 After mobilizing local groups, often with a screening of Bag It, advocates strategically worked to win over council members, as Romer explained:

Constituent outreach is key: finding influential people to talk to their council members. Targeting a council member who might be a soft yes or a soft no, and making sure people in their local districts are supporting this… Usually I identify which district is about to vote for a law, identify local groups that care about water and water-related issues, and even local businesses that might care, because there are economic interests and not just environmental interests.26

Before being elected, Culver City (California) Councilwoman Meghan Sahli-Wells was part of Transition Culver City, an initiative to promote sustainability, which hosted a screening of Bag It. Sahli-Wells said many people who attended screenings of the film came to the city council meetings and asked the council to take action. “The film helped to gather people and spur them into action,” she said.27 Sahli-Wells later included banning plastic bags as part of her campaign platform when she ran for city council. She said the film screenings were also a valuable tool in persuading others on the city council when she got there:

One of our colleagues went to see the film, and it was helpful to have him there because he was not a person in favor of [the ban]. It also was important for him to see that there was community interest, and that people would take time out of their day to come see the film and discuss it.28

Image URL: www.bagitmovie.wordpress.com

As more and more cities passed local bans, the plastics industry pushed back. Industry lawsuits were having a chilling effect on local momentum, as Sahli-Wells explained:

The plastics industry started suing local governments over the bag bans that they had passed… So, even if cities wanted to pass these bag bans, they were hesitant because they were afraid they would be sued by this mega-industry.29

After her election, Sahli-Wells helped finally pass the ban for Culver City, thanks in part to an innovative effort at the county level to ward off the threat of lawsuits:

Los Angeles County is huge, and a county supervisor has more power and money than most state senators and assembly members because of the large population and budget. The County passed an Environmental Impact Report covering the entire county that individual cities could use to pass their own bag bans. It was through this process that Culver City and other cities were able to have more confidence in passing their bans [lessening the fear of industry lawsuits].30

The plastics industry also began pushing for state-level pre-emption laws that made it illegal for local governments to pass laws banning plastic bags.

“Pre-emption is one of the biggest problems with bag laws and local efforts to stop plastic pollution,” said Romer, who has worked extensively on plastic bag efforts in New York and other states. “You can spend all the time you want, but if the state legislature decides to adopt pre-emption, it stops it immediately.”31 This led advocates to renew their push at the state level while maintaining campaigns for local laws to be passed.

In 2014 in California, legislators passed a statewide plastic bag ban law (Senate Bill 270), but the industry continued to fight. The law was scheduled to take effect July 1, 2015, and it would have been the first statewide ban on single- use plastic grocery bags in the nation. Implementation was delayed until November 2016, pending the outcome of a referendum financed by plastic bag companies in Texas and South Carolina.32 Industry groups spent more than $6 million to defeat the bill.33 However, a majority of Californians voted in 2016 to support the law and so it was finally put into force.34 The fight to ban plastic bags has continued in states across the country, and, as Patton observed, “Bag It has been an essential tool in the movement to stop plastic pollution and raise awareness of toxic impact.”35

PERSPECTIVES OF THE CHANGE AGENTS

Bag It became an essential tool for bringing together local activists in order to pass plastic bag bans. It was used successfully to mobilize efforts at both the local and state levels, which was important since advocacy campaigns had to work at different levels depending on the political climate. Its humorous, fact-filled approach was well-received by knowledgeable advocates and people who were learning about the issue for the first time.

The film was part of building momentum to get to the place where cities wanted to take that step.... It became something that the organizations used to build awareness and real political momentum.

CULVER CITY COUNCILWOMAN MEGHAN SAHLI-WELLS

Connect with Comedy

Humor was key to both the film’s branding and the surrounding campaigns. “The film is funny,” said Patton, adding that the humor helped engage audiences who otherwise might resist its message, and particularly helped with young people at college screenings:

There’s so much value to finding something funny, but also to adding some levity to an issue. You don’t see it in every single film about plastic pollution… It’s a really enjoyable story.36

Success Can Bring Backlash

As more and more cities successfully passed plastic bag bans, the plastics industry pushed for state legislatures to step in and block local efforts through pre-emption laws. Pre-emption laws have been used in the past to block local governments from passing anti-smoking,37 gun safety, minimum wage and anti-discrimination laws.38 Since some state legislatures are more conservative on these issues than city governments, this tactic can be successful. But the advocates fought back. Patton explained one approach:

We’ve used Bag It as a way to build awareness and educate members of the community about not supporting state-level pre-emption bills. For example, we did two community screenings —one in New Orleans, one in Lafayette—with presentations before and after, and then used those screenings to sign people up to activate them when we needed them to call their senators at the state level.39

Adjust Strategies to Changing Political Climates

When legislation failed at the state level in California, advocates changed their focus to local governments in order move the ball forward. When municipal governments were concerned by the threat of industry lawsuits, advocates worked at the Los Angeles County level to find a solution. Then after a significant number of local laws were in place, there was enough political momentum and public support for the statewide law that eventually passed and was affirmed by referendum.40 This flexibility allowed advocates to keep making progress even when the political climate changed and one path appeared to be blocked.

Let Locals Lead

The success of the campaigns was driven by local screenings that motivated local citizens to band together and change things in their towns and cities. The filmmakers developed website toolkits to support these local efforts — keeping the control in the hands of local citizens. Romer advised:

Having a national group come in and dictate what should happen on a local level generally doesn’t work with local policy advocacy… A national group can put more eyes on something that’s happening, but they should partner with local groups and people as much as possible, so there are still people on the ground when the national group leaves so the local people have [local advocacy partners] to work with. The local people still need to be in charge on the local level.41

COAL ASH STORIES

FILM OVERVIEW

Coal Ash Stories, a collection of short films distributed in 2014, was a project led by Working Films’ Senior Campaign Coordinator Andy Myers, with former Senior Social Media Strategist Kristin Henry, and Working Films’ Co-Directors Molly Murphy and Anna Lee. The team aimed to humanize an urgent local environmental justice crisis and to empower local communities in North Carolina who were impacted by toxic spills of coal waste, known as “coal ash.” The project was later used for similar community-based advocacy in states impacted by the environmental and public health effects of coal ash. The project synopsis:

Coal Ash Stories is a compilation of four short films that illustrate the public health concerns, policy issues, and ways communities are responding to this toxic waste. The series is informing residents and drawing attention to the toxic impact of coal ash on communities. We’re using Coal Ash Stories to engage the public and increase the demand for stricter regulation of storage facilities and cleanup of past spills. So far, the series has toured North Carolina, Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois, Alabama, Virginia, and Florida.42

THE JOURNEY: FROM FILM TO LOCAL POLICY ENGAGEMENT

Working Films+ is a long-established pioneer and leader in local and state documentary-based grassroots community education and engagement.1 For nearly two decades, the North Carolina-based nonprofit has built partnerships among nonfiction media-makers, nonprofit organizations, educators, and advocates “to advance social justice and environmental sustainability, and support community-based change.”46 In 2014, Working Films launched a local film initiative in North Carolina about the little-known dangers of coal ash; the effort evolved into a multiyear, multi-state campaign.

“Until that point, we had only facilitated more traditional film impact campaigns,” said Working Films Co-Director Molly Murphy. “This was an opportunity to flip our model and to engage communities in rapid response to issues.”47

In response to the spilling of 39,000 tons of toxic coal ash into North Carolina’s Dan River, Working Films partnered with state and national organizations to develop Coal Ash Stories—a series of short films that endeavored to “educate citizens and draw public and political attention to the toxic impact of the disaster.”48 The collection of short films – 30 minutes total running time across them – was shown across the state.

Screenings were co-hosted by local groups and post- screening discussions focused on local concerns, particularly about safe drinking water. Initially, much of the focus was simply helping audiences to understand, in human terms beyond the complexity of scientific and technical terms, the reality of coal ash and the reasons it was dangerous to families across the state.

When choosing local partners, Working Films assessed whether or not the groups were engaged in the issue, and if so, the scope of their efforts. Additionally, the team considered the extent to which each group had a need for increased support and membership, and, most importantly, had the capacity to bring new active participants into organizing initiatives. “We look closely at the local organizations and national organizations and see where the goals can align,” said Murphy.49

People were shocked at every [screening] event that this problem could have gotten so big. They were outraged that Florida has done nothing to stop utilities from storing coal ash so dangerously. They were ready to take action right then and there.

ADAM REAVES OF THE SOUTHERN ALLIANCE FOR CLEAN ENERGY

State Representative Pricey Harrison spoke at one event about the coal ash legislation she had been trying to get passed for years.50 As Representative Harrison explained, Duke Energy had such great influence in North Carolina — the governor at the time was a former Duke Energy executive — that it was challenging to advance legislation like hers. She said she had gotten pushback from policymakers from both political parties. Coal Ash Stories “illustrated what was really happening, including the lack of movement in the legislature,” she said.51

After hosting 15 screening events in North Carolina, Working Films expanded the campaign to other states. In December 2014, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had released a coal ash rule that provided guidance and regulatory language for states, although individual states were left to adopt and enforce. This was a critical moment for citizens to engage officials in their states to ensure strong policies were adopted. Working Films took Coal Ash Stories to states where organizers were building statewide support for clean-up and further prevention of pollution from coal ash, including Alabama, Florida, Indiana, Missouri, Tennessee, and Virginia.52

“Our attention to this issue is critical – now that the federal EPA has left the enforcement of the coal ash rule in our hands,” said Patricia Schuba of the Labadie Environmental Organization, one of Working Films’ local partners in Missouri. “We must get the Missouri Department of Natural Resources to adopt the federal guidelines and agree to enforce them in all cases if we are to protect Missouri communities and our valuable water resources.”

In 2015, the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) considered storing coal ash in a land ll near the site of an earlier spill that had dumped 1.1 billion gallons of toxic coal ash. Working Films partnered with local organizations to host a series of screenings intended “to generate public comments in response to TVA’s land ll permit request.”54

These films illustrated what was really happening, including the lack of movement in the legislature.

NORTH CAROLINA STATE REPRESENTATIVE PRICEY HARRISON

Back in North Carolina, the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) held public hearings in 2016 about prioritizing closures of 14 Duke Energy coal ash sites across the state. Based on public comments at the hearings and other information, the DEQ would then rank the sites based on how urgent a threat they posed. Working Films again partnered with local organizations to host six more Coal Ash Stories events. These events were strategically held in towns and cities where public hearings had been scheduled.55

According to a Working Films report:

“The events provided a catalyst for audiences to write comments and receive information about the upcoming hearings. The screenings were also an opportunity to talk with neighbors, issue experts, and advocates about how to get involved in ongoing efforts to protect their communities. The tour happened at a critical time for citizens to speak out for a transparent, swift, and protective plan to safely store coal ash and ensure safe drinking water for neighbors of coal ash sites. This was the first and only opportunity for direct public input on the fate of Duke’s North Carolina coal ash basins.”56

Katie Hicks, Associate Director of Clean Water for North Carolina, said, “I think it was a great way to get people engaged who aren’t directly impacted by coal ash but want to be a part of these hearings. It was very timely; we got a lot of interest.”57

The screenings actually helped raise awareness about the public hearings. “Not many people were hearing about the public comment period coming up until they saw news coverage about our film screenings,” said Andy Myers from Working Films. “So there was a kind of amplification effect from our screenings, even in smaller communities.”58

“The films provided an opportunity to provide outreach and education on the issue of coal ash. In turn, the increased awareness played into the record turnouts for the public hearings on the coal ash closure plans,” said Amy Adams, North Carolina Campaign Coordinator for Appalachian Voices, one of Working Films’ partners.59

Duke Energy representatives showed up unexpectedly at some of the screening. The organizers took advantage of these surprise visits by inviting the representatives up to the stage after the screenings so that audience members could directly ask questions and voice their concerns.60 Working Films’ Senior Campaign Coordinator Andy Myers said, “Our branding across the state was that there was no such thing as a low priority community, so we were pushing Duke Energy to go above and beyond and clean them all up, not only just the few sites that were deemed higher priority.”61

Following the public hearings, DEQ appeared to change course and classified all the coal ash sites as high or intermediate priority, apparently agreeing with advocates who contended that no sites should be ranked as low priority.62 While there remained a lot more work ahead, many advocates saw this as an important step forward.

“Faced with overwhelming public pressure and clear proof of contamination and other hazards, Governor Pat McCrory and DEQ finally acknowledged today what citizens have known for years: that all failing coal ash pits pose a significant risk to communities in North Carolina,” said D.J. Gerken, managing attorney of the Asheville, N.C., office of the Southern Environmental Law Center.63

Image URL: www.workingfilms.org

PERSPECTIVES OF THE CHANGE AGENTS

Coal Ash Stories took a different approach to film-based grassroots community education and engagement—using shorts for a more rapid- response campaign. This proved effective, particularly when screenings were timed to coincide with public comment periods. The short format of the films allowed for more audience engagement and action at screenings, which advocates credited as helping to increase participation in the public comment periods.

The Power of Shorts

In the beginning, Working Films turned to shorts about coal ash primarily out of necessity. “We wanted to use films to help address this issue,” said Working Films Co-Director Molly Murphy. “[But] we only had short videos from Earth Justice and other organizations, not even feature length films.”

But this format turned out to be a great asset. “This project really sold us on film shorts,” said Murphy.

“Having 30 minutes of media content allows a lot of time to really localize the issues and have a good engagement,” added Andy Myers, Working Films’ campaign coordinator. “Also, if there is something as specific as a public comment, it gives time for people to learn how to write public comments and even write them there on site. So the short film allows for the important business of the local advocacy to happen.”

“It’s hard to keep a legislator in the room long enough for a documentary feature film,” said North Carolina State Representative Pricey Harrison. “With shorter films, it’s easier.”64

Promoting a series of shorts does have its challenges, said Murphy. “You need to create a brand, like we created a brand called Coal Ash Stories.”

Adapting to Audiences

Using short films also enabled Working Films to more easily adapt the film series to different times and places. For the second North Carolina campaign, they added two films that addressed more recent developments in the state to make the series even more relevant locally.65 One of the films screened in Missouri featured Joe Grohs of Festus, Missouri, who warned about the dangers of not cleaning up coal ash while standing in front of a polluted lake.

This attention to local needs is central to Working Films’ approach. “Because we work in ground-up change, we take into account host organizations’ priorities, which vary based on where they are located,” said Murphy. “We work to make sure our screenings are used in an intentional way, and to make sure the activists in the room are able to take advantage of the opportunities the films present. We work to facilitate shared priorities with our local partners working on the issues.”

Focusing on local concerns in the post-screening discussions also helped engage audiences. Emerald Coastkeeper Laurie Murphy, the main host of the Pensacola, Florida, screening said, “My biggest highlight was when the audience collectively gasped when they were told of the unattended coal ash ponds sitting on islands in the middle of Escambia River.”66

Targeted Timing and Location

Working Films and its partners were strategic about the locations and timing of screenings of the second campaign in North Carolina in order to inform residents and involve them in the public comment period. “Our timing was completely and totally about getting people to speak out when it mattered most, and creating an avenue where they could,” said Myers. “Public comment periods are so important because that is the time the public’s voice actually really matters and is on the record… We used the screenings to get people to come to the public comment period, and in some cases, to actually watch the film and prepare their comments in the theater right then and there.” Amy Adams, North Carolina campaign coordinator for Appalachian Voices, one of Working Films’ partners, credited the increased awareness about the issue for the “record turnouts for the public hearings.”68

The messages in Coal Ash Stories resonate throughout Tennessee’s coal mining communities, particularly in Kingston where so many have been affected by the disastrous TVA spill of 2008.

DAVID WASILKO, STATEWIDE ORGANIZING FOR COMMUNITY EMPOWERMENT MEMBER

In Tennessee, Working Films and its partners planned screenings around the time of an impending coal ash storage decision “to build public pressure and ensure regulatory agencies do their job.”68 While it may not always be possible to time screenings so closely to actual policy events, it can help show the relevance of an issue – and to mobilize citizens to action.

PLAYGROUND: THE CHILD SEX TRADE IN AMERICA

FILM OVERVIEW

Playground: The Child Sex Trade in America is a feature- length documentary film directed by Libby Spears. The documentary, which focuses on the little-understood topic of domestic child sex trafficking in the United States, premiered in 2009 in the United States at the Tribeca Film Festival, and internationally later that year at both the Warsaw Film Festival and Vancouver International Film Festival. The official film synopsis:

Challenging the notion that the sexual exploitation and trafficking of children is limited to back-alley brothels in developing countries, the documentary feature film, Playground: The Child Sex Trade in America traces the phenomenon to its disparate, and decidedly domestic, roots — among them the way children are educated about sex, and the problem of raising awareness about a crime that inherently cannot be shown. Playground includes interviews with Ernie Allen, former president of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the late Judge Sanford “Sammy” Jones, Former Chief Judge of the Fulton County Juvenile Court, and other experts, and unfolds as a search for Michelle, an everyday American girl who was lost to the underbelly of sexual exploitation as a child and has yet to resurface a decade later.69

THE JOURNEY: FROM FILM TO LOCAL POLICY ENGAGEMENT

By the time she started producing Playground, director Libby Spears knew a great deal about the topic of child sex trafficking already. She had spent the better part of a decade investigating the sex trafficking industry in other parts of the world, including Thailand and South Korea. But what she learned there was crucial to the film that focused a spotlight at home in the United States. According to an interview, Spears said her international work revealed that the United States is “influencing the global demand and growth of the sex trafficking industry.”70

The higher profile the film becomes, the more likely it is to affect the legislative process. If the film goes to a festival and gets an award, if the filmmaker is in a magazine story, anything that elevates the story and makes it more relatable and visible, it helps. Legislative staffers are just like everyone else, responding to the information they are given.

JOEL SHAPIRO, FORMER SENIOR LEGISLATIVE STAFFER, SENATOR RON WYDEN (D-ORE.)

Although her original film focused on the international scope of the issue, she shifted her focus to the United States as her research and conversations with advocates like Ernie Allen, CEO of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, revealed that the issue of children exploited and trafficked domestically was both misunderstood and generally not known. Understanding that a documentary film that focused on statistics alone would be insufficient, the film team chose to tell the story of one young person, Michelle Brown, because it featured so many aspects of the system that perpetuates the problem. In 2004, while directing Playground, Spears founded a new organization, the Nest Foundation, dedicated to ending the sexual exploitation of children.71

The filmmakers did not have policy change in mind as they were making the film, as they worked to ensure the accuracy of their facts and portray intimate human stories. But as they approached the end of the editing process, according to Spears, “it became clear that the film could have a tremendous impact in addressing laws that we encountered in the making of the film – laws that disproportionately criminalized victims and the lack of policy advancements that earmarked funding for resources, services, and shelters.”72

The filmmakers began to engage local communities with the film’s trailer even while the final film was edited into its feature-length format. The strategy proved useful in starting initial conversations and helping to shape a likely impact strategy, which moved from general public awareness to an additional level of concern about policy solutions. After the film was completed, Spears and her team began a grassroots screening tour as the film played in film festivals, and the ideas for public engagement evolved. Originally focused on raising awareness, the team learned of a glaring legislative opportunity: At the time, no federal or state legislation decriminalized the children themselves – the victims – which limited the opportunity to help them, a ripple effect. According to Spears and her team:

At the time, there were no laws that differentiated between adults who willingly engaged in sex work, and children who were being forced to sell themselves. Because children were being arrested and treated like criminals, there were no services available to them. The most important thing that needed to happen for policy change was for minors to be recognized as victims, then resources would be made available to them.73

The film team formed partnerships with three nonprofit organizations that were expert advocates and policy specialists on the issue of exploited children: Polaris Project, National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and ECPAT-USA. Spears and her team supported their policy change objectives with screenings and events, and helped spark new understanding from policymakers themselves, who had not seen a story like Playground focused on child sex exploitation in the United States.

There were meetings we had with policymakers where literally the chiefs of staffs’ jaws would be open.

LIBBY SPEARS, DIRECTOR, PLAYGROUND

Federal policy awareness was immediate, assisted in large part by the film. When two senators – Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Senator Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) – saw the film at a screening hosted by Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), both took early action to address the issue. Senator Durbin hosted one of the first U.S. Senate hearings focused on child sex trafficking in the United States, citing Playground as the inspiration. On February 24, 2010, Senator Durbin opened the hearing, called “In Our Own Backyard: Child Prostitution and Sex Trafficking in the United States,” by introducing Libby Spears and the film:

Recently I saw a powerful documentary, along with Senator Wyden—it was actually at the home of Senator Boxer ,who invited us over. It was a documentary entitled Playground, and it was directed by a visionary filmmaker named Libby Spears, who is with us today…I would like to show, if I can, a short, 4-minute excerpt from this documentary which had such a profound impact on Senator Wyden and myself….Libby Spears, thank you. I know when we met you said that you had started your research on this issue looking overseas at the international trafficking, and somebody said you ought to look at home. And I am glad you did and opened our eyes to this, and thank you for your inspiration that led to this hearing today, and I hope it leads to new laws that will protect these children and deal with them in the right, humane way. This documentary opened the eyes of Senator Wyden and myself and many others—Senator Boxer. It is estimated that over 100,000 American children became sex-trafficking victims last year and every year.74

Image URL: http://www.nestfoundation.org/playground

Wyden credited the documentary with playing a vital role in building support for bipartisan legislation he introduced along with Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas).75 The Wyden-Cornyn Bill, known formally as the Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking Deterrence and Victims Support Act, was introduced in March 2011, providing funding for essential services like shelters for child victims of domestic sex trafficking, training for law enforcement, and calls for states to treat minor as victims, not criminals.76 In January 2015, Senator Cornyn introduced the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act; the bill, sponsored by original co-sponsors Senators Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), and Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), became law in May 2015.77

Along the way, the film screened at both public events and closed- door sessions with federal decision-makers, including: An FBI screening for 450 special agents, where the film was introduced by FBI Director Robert Mueller and Unit Chief of Crimes Against Children Alan Nanavaty; the Luxor International Forum, the first global gathering with particular focus on highlighting the pivotal role of the business community in anti- trafficking efforts, attended by over 400 participants from more than 30 countries; a hearing before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law; the Judicial Conference for U.S. Judges; Senator Wyden’s Human Trafficking congressional briefing; and a screening for federal judges.78

But, like many social justice issues, the policy opportunity was not only on the federal level. The issue was addressed differently, yet urgently, on the state level, and the role of the film in supporting expert advocacy organizations’ policy work was valuable, strategic, and timely. By the time Playground was produced, expert advocacy organizations — including leaders like Polaris Project and ECPAT-USA — had been engaged in the hard work of advocating for state laws to help minors.79

The state-level “Safe Harbor” laws “have two components: legal protection and provision of services,” although they are enforced differently on the state level; they mean the difference between official recognition of the victims as victims, not prostitutes.80

The time frame in which Playground was produced and distributed coincided with the formal legislative advocacy at the state level, not only the federal level. According to ECPAT-USA Executive Director Carol Smolenski, Playground became the indispensable strategic tool to show the public and state legislators that the victims were victims – and without the human portrayal of an intimate, misunderstood challenge, the ripple effect of state laws passing would have been a greater uphill battle. Safe Harbor laws have now passed in 34 states as of 2015,81 up from 18 states in 2013.82 The first state-level Safe Harbor law went into effect in New York in 2010.83 Playground was leveraged for the state-level Safe Harbor laws beginning with the crucial first state, and according to Smolenski, the film played the crucial role in helping and urging the public and elected officials to see the problem completely differently:

Image URL: http://www.nestfoundation.org/playground

When New York was considering a Safe Harbor Law, I remember hearing that one of the legislators said “we don’t want those kids on our block” and I knew we really needed to do education. We used [the film] in a lot of public education things in general, and that’s the first stop for changing laws is to educate the public and the legislators in the first place. I like that Libby’s film is national and takes place in various places around the country. We needed to show that it wasn’t just one kind of girl that was being trafficked – it’s not just an urban poor people phenomenon, not just black but also white…I was really gratified by how quickly people really got it. It’s so gratifying for me to see people really “get it” for the first time. There has been so much more awareness now by child protective service workers now, more resources, more ways to help these children.84

The commitment from filmmakers to do this level of advocacy and policy becomes a full-time job, so the difference was that we were willing to put in the time to promote policy change, and work with advocacy experts like ECPAT-USA. We had goals beyond just circulating the film, and we really wanted to a make long-term impact.

LIBBY SPEARS, DIRECTOR, PLAYGROUND

PERSPECTIVES OF THE CHANGE AGENTS

For the issue of child sex exploitation in the United States, Playground was distributed at an optimal, crucial time in an ongoing advocacy movement for both federal and state policy change. It was a moment during which real momentum – in both awareness and a willingness to demand change – had begun for the public and elected officials at multiple levels of government. Additionally, the challenges faced by the policy advocates – that is, longstanding framing of an issue about “bad kids” – were helped by the intimacy of human storytelling provided by documentary film. The advocates and experts knew about child sex trafficking in the United States for many decades, but both public and policymaker awareness and real understanding were scant. The film provided both a narrative re-imagining – re-framing – of the core issue itself, while also serving as an educational and mobilization tool.

Local Angles

One of the first film screenings took place in Portland, Oregon, where much of the filming had taken place. The local connection to the stories was meaningful to the policy engagement on both federal and local levels. According to filmmaker Libby Spears, Portland’s District 4 Multnomah County Commissioner Diane McKeel attended one of the earliest local screenings of the film, which had a tremendous impact on her involvement in forming a response to the commercial sexual exploitation of children in Portland.85 Very soon after the local screening, a senior staffer from the office of Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Joel Shapiro, learned about the film from McKeel, his local colleague based in Portland:

I was contacted by local elected officials working on the issue…County Commissioner Diane McKeel was the first person to talk with me about this issue, also one of the senior assistant district attorneys on this issue, one of the senior officers in the police bureau. Most of them talked with me more about the issue, but some mentioned specifically the film and encouraged me to get in touch with Libby, so that’s what I did. I reached out to Libby and I wanted to find out what she had been learning – at that point, she had been working on the issue longer than I had, so I wanted to learn from her. I wanted to find out from her the sources and contacts she already had, to utilize the efforts she had already put in.86

Thank you for your inspiration that led to this hearing today, and I hope it leads to new laws that will protect these children and deal with them in the right, humane way. This documentary opened the eyes of Senator Wyden and myself and many others.

SENATOR DICK DURBIN (D-ILL.)

Issue Re-Framing

For experts and advocates working on child sexual exploitation in the United States, the issue of issue re-framing was not a mere semantics challenge, but a fundamental barrier to change. Prior to the legislation around the issue, exploited minors were referenced within the context of “child prostitution,” a failure to recognize their status as victims, not willing participants. Carol Smolenski of ECPAT-USA articulated this challenge, and the film’s role in shifting the narrative:

In some ways, Playground was part of a movement that was already taking place. It came out as the shift was just starting to take place and it contributed to that shift. Services are usually developed at the local level, and it contributed to that. It also really contributed to a recognition by law enforcement that these were not bad kids but kids that needed help. The film is a completely different way of looking at it.87

For Senator Wyden’s former senior legislative staffer, Joel Shapiro, the need for this kind of re-framing and education was not only imperative for the public and advocacy outcry, but also for elected officials.

Having the film was a tremendous resource because we could use a screening of the film as a way to educate people – as a focal point to organize the issue – and it’s a much more accessible way to educate people about the issue than to say “we’re going to have X expert in and have a lecture.” Those happen all day long. You could spend all day long on Capitol Hill giving expert presentations that are dry. As a staffer, you need information and that’s how you do your job. But to have something that is more accessible and more powerful was a really great, important, powerful resource.88

At the same time, one of the keys to the film’s utility for policymakers and advocates was its focus on showing the problem, not advocating for a particular solution. For the advocates and policymakers, focusing – perhaps unwittingly – on unrealistic solutions would have meant the film likely wouldn’t have been shown. According to the executive director of ECPAT-USA, the policy advocacy expert:

I actually don’t think the film showed real concrete solutions. It was more upstream than that and showed the problems. We could use the film to show our own recommendations about the solutions and what should happen. It was always useful to show the film along with a panel of experts to talk about what the solutions should be. We could not have adopted the film if it had advocated for solutions that we knew wouldn’t work.89

Image URL: http://www.nestfoundation.org/playground

Storytelling as Essential Policy Advocacy

Although the film itself focuses on intimate human stories, its command of factual information and experts was essential to the film’s reception by elected officials. Notably, Playground was not perceived as partisan advocacy, but instead, as a well- researched, factual film – not a one-sided ideological essay. According to Joel Shapiro, former senior aide to Senator Wyden:

The way that Libby put together the film was such that she became an expert. She was working with tremendously experienced people. She had very qualified experts that she interviewed and spoke to. Having this be nonpartisan was very important. My boss made a decision when I first approached him about introducing a bill on this topic, and he said, we have to find a Republican and this needs to be a bipartisan approach. We focused on Cornyn because he is from Texas, and there was a lot of trafficking down there and a lot reflected in the film, and he was on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and he agreed to be the lead co-sponsor. It’s very easy to dismiss films that are seen as partisan. There are so many public policy issues we work on that would lend themselves to documentary treatment.90

Libby Spears started out as a filmmaker but now has become an advocate and expert about the sexual exploitation of children, and I just love that. How could you ever make the story without caring about the outcome?

CAROL SMOLENSKI, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ECPAT-USA, ADVOCACY GROUP

For Carol Smolenski, executive director of advocacy group ECPAT-USA, the opportunity to work with documentary storytelling through Playground changed her perspective about the importance of storytelling as a strategic, essential policy tool. During the crucial first state-level Safe Harbor law advocacy effort in New York, she leveraged the film directly by showing it to state legislators to help them understand the problem. She noted that the storytelling approach mattered – “it had to be an honest portrayal, respectful of the survivors who are shown” – along with an engaging narrative:

Playground was the only movie that really showed this issue. [Without it] I wouldn’t have had any other way to tell engaging case study stories about this issue. It doesn’t take much effort to watch, and it’s engaging and compelling – we really needed it to help shift this issue.

Now I think that video is the most important thing in sending out our message – period. Libby came along at the early stages. Maybe shorter videos would be compelling now. I think making a full-length documentary about the issue was groundbreaking at the time. Video is everything now. Last year we did a 2-minute PSA about sexual exploitation in U.S. hotels and it was so widely viewed that I want to do it for everything we do. It’s the future and Libby’s film started out that way, and we really have to continue.91

SIN BY SILENCE

FILM OVERVIEW

More than seven years in the making, Sin by Silence, directed by Olivia Klaus, premiered in 2009 on the festival circuit. The film’s local grassroots tour was prolific, visiting hundreds of community centers, university locations, town halls, and other locations throughout the country over the next several years. Sin by Silence premiered on TV on Investigation Discovery in October 2011. According to the synopsis:

From behind prison walls, SIN BY SILENCE reveals the lives of extraordinary women who advocate for a future free from domestic violence. Inside the California Institution for Women, the first inmate- initiated and led group in the U.S. prison system, shatters the misconceptions of domestic violence. Against the system and against the odds, the women of Convicted Women Against Abuse have risen to expose the stigma of the cycle of domestic violence. Through their stories of terror and hope, the viewer can begin to understand the cycle of violence, the signs of an abuser, and how each and every one of us is responsible for changing the tragedy of domestic violence.92

THE JOURNEY: FROM FILM TO LOCAL POLICY ENGAGEMENT

For Sin by Silence director, Olivia Klaus, the film and the parallel domestic violence policy engagement were virtually inseparable. Klaus began making the film after beginning a years-long stint as a volunteer in a women’s prison, where she learned that thousands of women were imprisoned after killing their abusive husbands following years of prolonged physical abuse at the hands of their intimate partners. The women, led by Brenda Clubine, had formed a network, Convicted Women Against Abuse (CWAA), to support one another and their struggle for justice in the legal system.

Because California state law at the time did not consider the prior and ongoing abuse conditions facing the women to be factors in either the trial or sentencing, they were sentenced as first- and second-degree murderers. To Klaus, this was tantamount to re-victimizing the survivors through the prison system – and worse, once the women were behind bars, they became invisible, forgotten. After earning the trust of the women, she slowly filmed their stories as they sought to repeal their sentences. Her main subject, Brenda Clubine, was a domestic violence survivor who had been imprisoned for 26 years for second-degree murder, from the age of 21. Clubine became an indispensable spokesperson for her story and those of other women in similar situations. Her story, revealed on camera in Sin by Silence, and in media interviews and screenings after she was released in 2008, was horrific:

In 1983, after 11 restraining orders led against her husband, and countless visits to the police department and hospital, Clubine hit her husband over the head with a wine bottle while fleeing for her life. Brenda was convicted of second degree murder with a 16 years to life sentence. The judicial system at this time, simply did not understand nor did they take the time, to weigh the substantial history of domestic violence Clubine experienced.93

No one listened for so long, and to actually believe that someone really wanted to make a difference, to share these women’s stories, but to hopefully be able to make a difference for someone else so they wouldn’t end up in the same circumstance as the women featured in the film...

BRENDA CLUBINE, DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SURVIVOR

Strategically, the grassroots engagement for the completed documentary focused on a ten-state strategy, in which Klaus and her team formed local partnerships and facilitated community screenings in the ten states with the worst statistics around intimate-partner domestic violence. In each state, Klaus partnered with coalitions that were part of state chapters for the National Coalition against Domestic Violence. Together, they hosted screenings of the film at local community colleges, local shelters, and other community screenings to make sure they “hit every target audience we could.”94

After a screening at the University of San Francisco, a member of the audience sent a copy of the film to California State Assemblywoman Fiona Ma (D-San Francisco and San Mateo Counties), chair of the Domestic Violence Select Committee for the California State Assembly. Ma immediately got to work on legislative change after inviting Klaus to screen the film for the Domestic Violence Caucus in Sacramento. According to Klaus, “the legislative change really started there at that screening, because every legislator who watched it wanted to do something about the issue [after watching].”95

She reached out to Heidi Rummel, an L.A.-based public interest attorney and law professor at the University of Southern California who had been deeply engaged with domestic violence policy in California. Ma understood Rummel’s expertise in state law on the issue, so she enlisted her help to craft legislation that could change the fate for the women currently in prison, along with others in the future. Between Olivia Klaus, film subject Brenda Clubine, and a coalition of domestic violence organizations in the state, Rummel helped to craft two pieces of legislation championed by Assemblywoman Ma as the Sin by Silence bills AB 593 and AB 1593, which allow expert testimony in jury trials about the effects of long-term intimate-partner domestic violence, and require that parole boards “give great weight to any information or evidence that proves the prisoner experienced intimate partner battering (IPB) and its effects at the time the crime was committed,” respectively.96 The AB 1593 summary statement outlined the scope of the problem:

Currently, over 7,000 women are imprisoned in California’s state prisons, the majority of whom have survived domestic violence. Several hundred women in California are serving time for killing their batterers and hundreds, if not thousands more, are serving time for domestic violence-related crimes. A California state prison study found that 93% of the women who had killed their significant others had been battered by them; 67% of these women indicated the crime resulted from an attempt to protect themselves or their children.97

While Assemblywoman Ma worked to ensure legislative support for the policy change, film director Olivia Klaus leveraged grassroots community screenings to garner public support and outcry to demand change at the California state level. The efforts to ensure legislative and public support, though, were symbiotic and interconnected. On October 12, 2012, hundreds of grassroots screenings and public support letters later, the two Sin by Silence bills were signed into law by Governor Jerry Brown. Both laws went into effect on January 1, 2013.98 Assemblywoman Ma lauded the achievement in her statement, recognizing the immediate opportunity to change the story for thousands of women: “I am so proud that Governor Brown has signed both of my bills. Today, we give hope to approximately 7,000 victims across the state who have survived domestic violence, who believed the system had failed them, and will now have an opportunity to speak out against injustice.”99 Olivia Klaus, after years of work to spotlight untold stories – deeply intimate portraits of survivors – stated:

Image URL: http://www.sinbysilence.com

Years ago when I started this journey, I had no idea what change would come through creating Sin by Silence, but I knew I couldn’t give up hope that we could make a difference to help free incarcerated, battered women. The passing of the Sin by Silence bills brings together a decade long journey of work to help right the wrong in this world. Now that legislative history has been made in California, we hope to carry on to the rest of the country.100

Approximately five years after the laws were passed, former Assemblywoman Fiona Ma reflected on the anniversary, the role of the documentary, and the ripple effect of change in an op-ed in the Huffington Post:

The emotional journey I experienced while watching the “Sin by Silence” documentary inspired me to help other survivors by introducing AB593 and AB1593, my “Sin by Silence” bills. At the time, I was the Chair of the Select Committee to End Domestic Violence and the first Asian- American woman Assembly Speaker pro Tempore in California history, so I was in a position where I could be a voice through legislation to try to help these domestic violence survivors….On this five year anniversary of the bills’ passage into law, I’m proud to say two other states, Oregon and New York, are focusing on similar legislation. I remember Glenda Virgil who, in 2013, was the first woman from the film to be released as a result of my bills. I was able to give a voice to the voiceless and give these women a fighting chance for justice. It was the right thing to do.101

PERSPECTIVES OF THE CHANGE AGENTS

The synergy among the women’s stories, the documentary, an influential member of the California State Assembly, and a legal expert, alongside a massive grassroots outcry of support, paved the path for legislative success. The voices of the insiders provide a deeper level of insight into the crucial role of the documentary itself, along with the strategic and tactical moves of the film team and advocates.

Image URL: http://www.sinbysilence.com

Sharing the Stories & Engaging the Public

Advocacy around domestic violence, both within California and around the country, was not new by the time Sin by Silence was released. Interest groups, attorneys, survivors, and families had been engaged in the issue for years. But they didn’t have the intimate stories of the women, and for Klaus, that was the missing element:

To help with the ongoing advocacy around these women, people started really using the film — grassroots advocates and groups finally had a way to share the stories of these women, which they didn’t have before. The advocacy includes helping domestic violence shelters, but also to help these women who had been stuck in prison. For the outreach campaign, the first step was to help the local shelters and communities to really talk about domestic violence, to help with donations and clothing. Once we had a community following [established through grassroots community screenings], the community following really helped to ensure the legislation could be passed.102

This is about every single woman all over the world who are stuck in these situations. It’s about all of us collectively who have suffered, and it’s time people understand it’s OK to talk about it, and communities can be part of making change. If one woman in prison can start a movement by starting the first abuse support group in prison in the nation, why can’t a woman’s church group and other women make the same difference?

BRENDA CLUBINE, DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SURVIVOR

Former Assemblywoman Fiona Ma asserted that the stories themselves were impossible to know without the documentary: “There was no way we were going to be able to meet these women, so the film gave us an entry into how serious this was and how many women are stuck in jail. The documentary was strong and powerful because it gave us a broader scope and opportunity to actually hear and see these women’s stories.”103

But the local angle of the film was key to the legislation – and to engaging supporters in a massive letter-writing campaign to the imprisoned women themselves, along with legislators. According to Klaus, the film would have been difficult to make, and indeed, the local legislation might have been impossible to imagine, without the local, direct connection to the survivors in California featured in the film.

In the advocacy community in California, people were really receptive, as we were part of the Domestic Violence Coalition in California, so we were already part of that community in a way. Drop-in advocacy or drop-in filmmaking [from another place] would not have worked on this issue – women would not have opened up and shared their stories, they had been so abused that it was hard for them to open up and have someone trust them with their story.104

Building & Supporting the Legislation

According to former Assemblywoman Fiona Ma, the documentary provided both the inciting information and ongoing support for the new legislation. Ma said, “we [staffers in my office and I] watched the film and we knew immediately we had to do something about this issue; we had no idea this was happening…. Every elected official and their staff that saw the film was sympathetic. No one thought this wasn’t a big deal. In politics, you usually focus on your constituents and your voters. These women were not our constituents or our voters, but people were supportive of my moving ahead. This had total bipartisan support – Democrats and Republicans.”105

Fiona Ma became a vocal and energetic champion for the film, the women’s stories, and the legislation, holding screenings and hearings, meetings with traditionally oppositional groups, and leveraging media opportunities about the film to build awareness of the issue and push the proposed legislation forward.

Image URL: http://www.sinbysilence.com

As the legislative push moved forward, Klaus and Sin by Silence followed the pathway of the advocacy directly, supporting local public engagement with additional footage and shorter versions of the film. In this way, they were able to create ongoing moments to keep up the public attention and outcry on the issue. Klaus shared:

I had so much footage from the film that we started crafting these short web videos to share with people, advocates and educators; with the educational license for the film, we also gave something like 2.5 hours of additional footage from what we filmed, and we made all of that footage available along with the educational version. We started releasing those stories slowly online particularly as the legislation got rolling. There are so many different aspects and angles to these stories that connect with the legal issues, as well.106

As the two pieces of legislation moved through the California House and Senate, Klaus supported the final push with the governor, who still needed to sign them into law. According to Klaus, “We then met with everyone in the governor’s office, giving them copies of the film, hosting a screening just for the governor’s office and bringing Brenda [the main film subject], and engaging all of our grassroots lists of supporters to bombard the governor’s office with letters and calls.”107 Ma agreed with this team strategy, stating that she and her office used a template letter to generate public support at the governor’s office, working with both their own office, but also with Klaus and the massive grassroots list of supporters Klaus had amassed through local screenings around the country.

However, Assemblywoman Ma explained that the legislative process won’t sustain itself on the journey to become law, even one sparked by an intimate documentary story, without a passionate, committed advocate on the inside of the process. According to Ma, working with local-level legislators and their small staffs as passionate experts was crucial, not only to this effort, but others: “Advocates who want to make change must have a champion in the legislative body. If a policy maker is not passionate and connected to the issue and the idea, it won’t really happen. It really takes certain members to fight. We know which members have strong staff, passion for their issues, and that’s what it takes.”108

The Roles of Story & Spokespeople

According to Assemblywoman Fiona Ma, local policymakers consider facts and statistics on a daily basis to help support legislation. But a story provides a different level of urgency, given the emotional connection:

A fact sheet would not have moved me. I don’t know who is writing the fact sheet, and it doesn’t move me. The movie is powerful because it humanizes what the issue is. For me, the film was the big driver. If someone had just handed me stats about 7,000 women sitting in prison who needed my help, it wouldn’t have been the same, compared to us saying “we need to help Brenda.” We had to change these women’s lives. We wanted to do the work to create a bill that was going to work, not just to die.109

But the story alone might not have been sufficient. As champions and intimate spokespeople, Olivia Klaus, the filmmaker, and Brenda Clubine, the film’s main subject, were indispensable, according to Ma. “Olivia would show up at any hearing, any screening, anything we needed….If we can’t get our star witnesses to show up, then our bills are going to die. Olivia and Brenda were like the lobbyists for us, every time they shared their story, it really moved us along.”110