Sentencing and Corrections

Public Safety Performance

State legislatures face many challenges in considering corrections and sentencing policies that both manage state spending and protect the public.  They do so today with more and better information on how various policies affect prison populations and strategies that are cost effective in meeting those objectives.

A new NCSL Criminal Justice Program project with the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts' Center on the States taps the best research and information available to help guide policy and practice.  Pew works with select states to diagnose growth in prison populations, and put a fiscal lens to sentencing and corrections policy options and reforms. 

On August 6, 2007, at NCSL's Annual Meeting in Boston, Massachusetts, the NCSL and Pew partnership kicked off with a luncheon program for the Law and Criminal Justice Committee.

State Sentencing and Corrections Legislation:  2007 Action, 2008 Outlook
State legislatures are concerned about the projected growth in prison populations and accompanying increases spending.  As a result, state legislatures passed laws in 2007 to expand community corrections, manage probation and parole violators, boost incentives for good behavior, prepare inmates for re-entry and link released offenders to community support.

For a state-by-state look at significant sentencing and corrections legislation in 2007 and corrections budget information for 2007 and 2008, click here

Meetings

• NCSL Annual Meeting - Public Safety Performance Briefing
  August 6, 2007 - Boston, Massachusetts
  This session provides an overview of the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts' Center on the States and its work in select states to distill information and provide assistance in crafting effective and fiscally sensitive sentencing and corrections policies.  The Public Safety Performance Project examines prison population forecasts and explores policy options for protecting public safety and controlling corrections spending.  To listen to audio from each of the speakers, click here.
  
• Fiscal Analyst Seminar
  September 4-7, 2007 - Portland, Maine
  NCSL hosted the annual Fiscal Analyst Seminar in Portland, Maine in early September, 2007.  Senior fiscal and tax staff from around the country attended professional development, plenary sessions, and specific subject area break out groups including, health, tax, education, and criminal justice. The criminal justice program in partnership with the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts' Center on the States hosted speakers to educate staff on growing prison populations, designing and measuring corrections, and state experiences with prison growth and cost control.  The view the presentations from the speakers, click here.

NCSL Publications

• State Funding for Corrections in FY 2006 and 2007 (May 2007)
  

Links

• "1 in 100:  Behind Bars in America 2008"  A new report by Pew's Public Safety Performance Project details how, for the first time in history, more than one in every 100 adults in America are in jail or prison—a fact that significantly impacts state budgets without delivering a clear return on public safety.  (January 2008)

• Public Safety, Public Spending:  Forecasting America's Prison Population 2007-2011 (Revised June 2007)
• Justice Reinvestment, a project of the Council of State Governments Justice Center and technical assistance provider under the Pew Public Safety Performance Project.
  • "Justice Reinvestment State Brief:  Texas (2007) and "Justice Reinvestment State Brief:  Kansas (2007)  These briefs are part of a series for state policymakers interested in learning how particular states across the country have employed a data-driven strategy called justice reinvestment to better manage corrections spending, increase public safety, and redirect some of the savings toward efforts that will improve conditions in the neighborhoods to which most people released from prison return.

• Center on Sentencing and Corrections, a project of the Vera Institute of Justice and technical assistance provider under the Pew Public Safety Performance Project.

Contact

For more information on this topic, please contact Alison Lawrence, 303-364-7700 or cj-info@ncsl.org