Features
Alternatives to Incarceration
by Christopher Cecil, MSW

At the June 2008 meeting of the Council of State Governments, Public Safety and Justice Task Force, in Lexington Kentucky, a policy discussion was held regarding alternatives to incarceration. The Task Force heard compelling presentations regarding innovative ways in which states are dealing with the pressing problem of prison overcrowding. Presenters included Jake Horowitz, Public Safety Performance Project, Pew Center for States; Michael Thompson, Executive Director, Council of State Governments Justice Center; and, Dawn Jenkins, Executive Advisor, Kentucky Department of Public Advocacy. 

The news that more than 1 in 100 adults in our country are behind bars is shocking to many Americans, but it shouldn’t come as a surprise. The incarceration rate has been marching toward this milestone for three decades, as a result of policy choices that put more offenders in prison and keep them there longer. All state health and public safety officials strive to be tough on crime in order to protect its citizens. Unfortunately, the policies that many states have adopted are not lowering the crime rate, nor improving recidivism rates.

Alternatives to incarceration include conditional release, electronic monitoring, work release, work crews, community service, restitution, drug testing, substance abuse treatment, drug courts, classes in job skills, mental health treatment, conflict resolution, and relapse prevention. States that established bipartisan teams to adopt alternatives to incarceration have lowered their prison population, improved recidivism rates, and lowered their crime rates.

One such state is North Carolina, where the legislature created the Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission Act of 1990 and directed the new Commission to

• create a correctional simulation model
• classify criminal offenses
• recommend structures for use by sentencing courts
• develop a comprehensive corrections plan, and
• determine what percentage of their sentences offenders would be obligated to serve before becoming eligible for parole

Through it’s efforts, the percentage of felons who were sentenced to prison terms fell from 47 to 37% between 1993 and 2005 – preserving prison space, and the possibility of longer sentences, for the most serious offenders. The proportion of nonviolent felony offenders sentenced to prison during that period dropped from 42 % to 23%. It was feared that the increased use of community sanctions would result in more crime, but that did not happen. Crime rates fell nearly 21% and violent crime fell by 31%. North Carolina’s new sentencing regime also achieved the fiscal stability the state needed. Today, North Carolina incarcerates about 38,000 inmates per year vs. the projected 54,000 had the reforms not been enacted – a difference worth hundreds of millions of dollars for the state budget.

Kentucky has also demonstrated the efficacy of community corrections through the Department of Public Advocacy, Social Worker Pilot Project. The pilot project, which served adults and juveniles from October 2006 to October 2007, resulted in substantial savings and decreased recidivism. This project secured treatment in the community for drug / alcohol abuse and mental illness; established  interventions that supported a judges or prosecutor’s decision to either conditionally release/divert the case or impose alternative sentencing which combined job training and treatment, employment, mental health treatment and GED classes; pretrial diversion and successful dispositional plans for youth and children in the juvenile justice system which presented reasonable alternatives to detention and commitment.

It was found that the Kentucky Social Worker Pilot Project was effective in several ways:

The recidivism rate of clients who worked with social workers was 15 to 18 percent compared to 34 percent overall in Kentucky.

93 percent of the adults who received drug or alcohol treatment abstained from those substances

80 percent of the clients referred to job training stayed in the training or completed it.

10,000 days of incarceration were saved by each social worker, equal to 27 years

After accounting for the cost of the social workers and the services used by the clients, the program saved $3.25 for every dollar invested.

Saved $300,000 and an estimated $3.1 milion if the program is fully funded.

The program "aims at changing the pattern of drug offenders endlessly recycled through the judicial and correctional systems, burdened with felony convictions that make it difficult for them to get work when they eventually rejoin society. It's a small wager when the stakes are so high and the odds are so good." (Lexington Herald-Leader, January 27, 2008).

Provided information to judges that they wouldn't have received otherwise in order to make informed decisions about those cases.

Although these findings are compelling, Kentucky did not establish funding to continue the Department of Public Advocacy, Social Worker Project. This decision will have a ripple effect as Kentucky – like many states - face funding cuts to education, mental health, substance abuse services, and public health programs.

In conclusion, scientific data supports use of alternatives to incarceration as an effective tool to reduce prison populations, lower recidivism, ameliorate criminal activity, and save millions of dollars. Despite compelling evidence, the majority of states are slow to shift paradigms and adopt alternate sentencing strategies.

Christopher Cecil, MSW, is an Education Specialist with the Kentucky Administrative Office of the Courts.

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