Announcement for 06/05/08
Vermont and Rhode Island Enact Initiatives to Increase Public Safety and Reduce Corrections Spending
At the beginning of the 2008 legislative sessions, policymakers in Vermont and Rhode Island faced projected growth in their prison populations, spiraling corrections costs, and high recidivism rates. Rather than allowing these trends to continue, state officials, with overwhelming bipartisan support, enacted legislation to increase public safety, avert spending on corrections, and reduce recidivism among people released from prison.
Although Vermont is one of the nation’s smallest states, over the last 10 years its prison population and incarceration rate have grown at a pace that surpasses the national average and has resulted in substantial growth in the state’s corrections budget. Vermont’s spending on corrections increased from 4 percent of state general funds in 1990 to 10 percent in 2008. Further, 50 percent of people released from prison were reconvicted within three years. According to analyses, if these trends persisted, Vermont’s prison population would experience a 23 percent increase by 2018 at a cost of at least $82 million to contract for out-of-state prison capacity.
"Vermont’s 50 percent recidivism rate is simply unacceptable given the impact on the safety of local communities and the cost to taxpayers," said Senator Richard Sears (D-Bennington), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. "To reduce recidivism and increase public safety, we needed to focus on investing in strategies to improve how we connect people with substance abuse needs to treatment and supervise them once released."
In May 2008 the Vermont legislature approved a package of policy changes that:
- reorganizes the state’s corrections facilities to establish a second work camp facility and consolidate other facilities to generate savings;
- institutes screening and assessment processes to identify people appropriate for substance abuse treatment and diversion programs;
- expands community-based strategies to reduce recidivism.
Policymakers anticipate that the package will save as much as $54 million by 2018. They plan to reinvest $3 million of the savings over the next two years in prison- and community-based treatment programs and transitional housing.
State leaders in Rhode Island were confronting similar problems. The number of persons incarcerated in the state was projected to grow 21 percent over 10 years at a cost of $300 million.
In May 2008, the Rhode Island legislature included significant changes to corrections policy in its supplemental budget that:
- standardize the way Rhode Island calculates earned time credits for people in prison who demonstrate good behavior;
- allows people in prison to earn time off their sentence for participation in educational, job-training, substance abuse and behavior modification programs;
- and, requires the Parole Board to utilize risk assessment to determine the likelihood of a person committing another crime when making parole-release decisions.
Together, the policy changes could realize $1 million in savings in 2009 and avert both the projected growth in the prison population and the need to build additional correctional facilities.
"I applaud our legislature’s commitment to increasing public safety by providing incentives for inmates to participate in treatment and programs that can reduce their risk to re-offend upon release," said A.T. Wall, director of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections.
At the request of the governor and legislative leaders in both states, the Council of State Governments Justice Center, through its Justice Reinvestment Initiative, provided technical assistance to policymakers in Vermont and Rhode Island. This assistance was made possible in part through funding provided by the Bureau of Justice Assistance, a component of the U.S. Department of Justice, and the Public Safety Performance Project of The Pew Charitable Trusts' Center on the States.
To learn more about the justice reinvestment strategy and the technical assistance that the Justice Center is providing to Vermont, Rhode Island, and other states, please see www.justicereinvestment.org.