Tony McCright Jr. is a Senior Program Specialist on the Justice Initiatives Team at the National League of Cities. He works in NLC’s Institute for Youth, Education, and Families to implement restorative criminal justice policies at the municipal level. Prior to this role, he began as NLC’s first Justice Reform Fellow, using his lived experience in the carceral system to bring new approaches to ongoing and new initiatives.
In 2022, Tony launched the Municipal Reentry Leaders Network, a national cohort of city reentry directors and higher ed reps whose goal is to improve reentry services at the local level. Before coming to NLC, he was a Fellow in the Georgetown University Pivot re-entry program and went on to support research and marketing projects for change-making organizations in the criminal justice and education spaces. While incarcerated, he took part in several ground-breaking pilot programs. Tony was one of the first mentors on the Young Men Emerging unit, which was designed to provide specialized programming for men 18-25. He was also in the pilot Georgetown University Prison Scholars and Humanity in Prisons programs.
In addition to his work for other organizations, he has successfully launched multiple entrepreneurial ventures. His current venture is a social impact real estate investment company that combats the historical effects of redlining by informing, organizing, and providing opportunities for residents in underserved areas to invest in their own neighborhoods. His ultimate goal is to expand the economic, housing, employment, and service opportunities available for returning citizens.