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U.S. Prison Count Continues to Drop

After nearly four decades of explosive growth, the U.S. prison population declined for two years in a row, according to the Justice Department.Inmate counts fell in about half the states in each year from 2009-10 and 2010-11.

With Governor’s Signature, New Jersey Expands Drug Courts

Governor Chris Christie signed a bill Thursday (July 19) that expands New Jersey’s drug court program and mandates treatment rather than jail time for drug abusers convicted of non-violent crimes. That makes New Jersey the first state to require drug treatment within the justice system. For months, the governor has

The Impact of California's Probation Incentive Program

California's probation system has been a major driver of prison admission, but early analysis shows that an incentive program is cutting probation revocations and corrections costs.

Collateral Costs

Collateral Costs: Incarceration’s Effect on Economic Mobility was a collaborative effort between the Pew Charitable Trusts' Economic Mobility Project and its Public Safety Performance Project (PSPP). The 2010 report examined the impact of incarceration on the economic opportunity and mobility of former inmates and their families.

Arkansas: Improving Public Safety and Containing Corrections Costs

Arkansas's prison population is projected to grow by as much as 43 percent over the next decade. Building and operating new prisons to accommodate this growth will cost approximately $1.1 billion between 2010 and 2020. With the state prison system already at full capacity, Arkansas policy makers are considering data-driven alternatives that will contain prison growth and corrections spending while protecting public safety. This June 2010 report detailed the steps state leaders took to advance public safety policy solutions.

Prison Count 2010

For the first time in nearly 40 years, the number of state prisoners in the United States has declined, according to Prison Count 2010, a survey by the Pew Center on the States.

Summary of the Delaware State of the State Address

Delaware Gov. Jack Markell (D) highlighted during his state of the state speech Jan. 20 his administration's efforts to curb state spending and promote jobs, and he promised to do more of the same.

Right-Sizing Prisons

In 2010, the Public Safety Performance Project asked business leaders at the forefront of these efforts to participate in a question and answer session on their approach to working with policy makers on public safety issues.

Maximum Impact

This 2009 report explored how, at a time when states are facing historic budget deficits, state leaders can prevent a large share of the nation’s criminal activity and cut corrections costs.

Policy Framework to Strengthen Community Corrections

This 2008 report discussed how states have added 1 million prison cells over the past 20 years, pushing the U.S. prison population to 2.3 million and the incarceration rate past 1 in 100 adults, by far the highest in the world.

Getting in Sync

Some offenders need to be put in prison. Others can be managed safely on probation in the community. This 2008 report looks at how judges and prosecutors often face the difficult task of figuring out what to do with defendants who don’t fit cleanly into either group.

One in 100

A 2008 report by Pew's Public Safety Performance Project detailed how, for the first time in history, more than one in every 100 adults in America were in jail or prison—a fact that significantly impacts state budgets without delivering a clear return on public safety.

Changing Direction

Despite having built more than 100,000 prison beds in the 1980s and ‘90s, Texas was looking at a 17,000-bed shortfall by 2012 at an additional cost of $900 million for fiscal years 2008 and 2009.

When Offenders Break the Rules

This 2007 report outlines how innovative policy makers are safely and cost-effectively managing a leading driver of prison admissions: parolees and probationers who break the rules of their community supervision.

What Works in Community Corrections

Dr. Joan Petersilia is one of the nation’s most respected experts on community corrections. In 2007, she spoke with Pew’s Public Safety Performance Project about what policy makers should know about the research on these critical programs.

You Get What You Measure

This 2007 report outlines how, as parole and probation agencies heed the call to manage for results, they are looking to models like the New York City Police Department’s Compstat program.

Calif. legislators looking out for stars behind bars

California lawmakers consider "Paris Hilton and Mel Gibson Protection Act." An Ohio Democratic Party staffer is fired when a blogger reveals a blast from her past, and Illinois Democrats get hot under the collar. In case you missed any of those stories this week, Worth Noting fills you in.

Fla. prisoners deal crime-solving tips

Florida law enforcers give inmates playing cards featuring photos of homicide victims and missing persons in hopes of cracking cold cases. Tennessee gets tough on prison visitors who wear "arousing undergarments." Nebraskans with alcohol-related convictions wear Lindsay Lohan-style ankle bracelets. In case you missed any of those stories this week, "Worth Noting" fills you in.

Public Safety, Public Spending

This February 2007 report was the first known attempt to determine the future growth of the nation's state and federal prison systems as a whole.

Prison-Population Boom Means Added Costs for States

The U.S. prison population rose 2.6 percent to a record high of 2,166,260 inmates during 2002, according to a recently released U.S. Justice Department report. The increase comes at a challenging time for states mired in a deep fiscal crisis, since 55 percent of all inmates are housed in state prisons.

States Turn To Private Prisons As Inmate Populations Increase

Used by a number of states during the 1800s, privately run prisons were legislated out of existence due to high-profile, inmate-abuse scandals following the Civil War. However, prison privatization is now back with a vengeance, thanks to mandatory sentencing, prison overcrowding and burgeoning corrections budgets.

Health Care Costs Rising As Prison Population Grows And Ages

Prison inmates are the only Americans with a constitutional right to health care, and the cost to deliver it is on the rise. States spend 10 percent of their corrections budgets on average to cover the cost of inmate health care -- a total of over $3 billion annually. As the prison population increases, ages and increasingly suffers from chronic illnesses such as AIDS and hepatitis, state policy makers must either foot the bill, change the way health care is delivered or rethink the sentencing laws that led to the problem in the first place.