The Seond Chance Act Proves it's Worth
With
corrections costs exceeding $60 billion a year, state and local
governments are rightly focused on making sure that newly released
prisoners stay out of jail instead of coming back in through a revolving
door.
The
Second Chance Act, signed into law by George W. Bush in 2008, was
designed to give momentum to this effort, providing money and training
for states, local governments and nonprofit organizations to help former
prisoners readjust to the community. But as it stands, federal
government spending on Second Chance Act programs amounts to less than
$100 a year for each newly released prisoner — far less than the
programs need and deserve.
A
new study from the National Reentry Resource Center, created under the
Second Chance Act, shows that recidivism rates can be significantly
reduced when states commit to jailing only people who present a risk to
public safety and to helping newly released prisoners find drug
treatment, psychiatric counseling and the other services they need for a
successful transition to the world beyond bars.
The
report compared the three-year recidivism rates for people released in
2007 to those of people released in 2010 for eight states — Colorado,
Connecticut, Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South
Carolina and Wisconsin — and found that the percentage declines in
recidivism rates ranged from 5.8 percent in Colorado to 19.3 percent in
North Carolina.
North
Carolina, for example, learned that probation revocations accounted for
half of its prison admissions and that three-quarters of those sent to
prison based on such revocations had not committed new offenses. The
State Legislature enacted sweeping reforms. It intensified community
supervision, and it gave probation officers better training and allowed
them to use other sanctions for people who violated the rules, like
punishing them with two or three days in the local jail instead of
sending them back to prison for lengthy stays.
The
state also established local re-entry councils that direct newly
released inmates to social services to help them readjust to the
community. The new measures drove down recidivism, allowing North
Carolina to close nine correctional facilities, hire more probation
officers and lend more support to drug treatment and other transitional
programs.
The
Second Chance Act has a crucial role to play by providing seed money
for new reforms and helping to distinguish what works from what does
not. Given the scope of the task at hand — and the fact that 700,000
people will be released from prison this year — the federal government
should be spending far more than the $67.7 million that went for this
purpose in the 2014 fiscal year. A higher level of expenditure would
more than pay for itself in terms of lower corrections costs.
1 comment:
This is a great example of wisely spending tax resources. Colorado should consider North Carolina's lead. Nearly 40% of Colorado prison admissions are for technical (non-criminal) parole/probation violations. Other sanctions should be available that will cost the taxpayers less and yet still provide the behavior incentives needed.
Another second chance that should be considered is making a law that makes it easier for people who have finished serving their time to get a job. With the internet and today's computer background checks, the mistakes of the past follow a person forever and so many companies won't hire someone with a past felony. The notion of having "paid for your crime" is dead. While it makes sense that a sex offender shouldn't work in a daycare or elementary school, why should they be denied a chance to work with computers or in a warehouse or in construction? Someone with fraud convictions should probably not be a bookkeeper, but why couldn't they serve food or work in sales? Colorado has a law that prohibits them from discriminating based on past convictions that have no relevance to the job being considered. However, public companies do it all the time.
Post a Comment