FILE – This April 22, 2014, file photo shows an employment application form on a table during a job fair at Columbia-Greene Community College in Hudson, N.Y. The Labor Department releases its weekly report on applications for unemployment benefits on Thursday, Sept. 25, 2014. (AP Photo/Mike Groll, File) A local civil rights group is joining a national effort to get criminal history questions taken off of job applications.
The Chattanooga-Hamilton County NAACP wants city government to “ban the box”– remove questions on job applications that ask about criminal history — to give people with convictions a better chance at employment.
A National Institute of Justice-funded study indicates that a criminal record reduces the likelihood of a job call back or job offer by about 50 percent.
But private employers and small businesses don’t want to ban criminal history questions. They say that how an applicant answers the questions indicates whether he or she can be trusted as an employee.
Gary Ball, owner of Tower Construction, said he has hired a number of people with criminal backgrounds, but hardly any of them have been keepers.