New Orleans: Who's in Jail and Why?

Everyone in New Orleans deserves to be safe. We rely on our criminal justice agencies—the police, the courts, and the jail—to ensure public safety, so we should ask ourselves regularly: how well is our system working? By looking at who we hold in our jail and why, we can begin to understand the role of detention in keeping our community safe and inform what our jail needs are, both now and going forward.Until recently, New Orleans led the nation in jail incarceration: before Katrina, we jailed people at a rate five times the national average. The consequences were dramatic for the tens of thousands of people booked into the jail each year who lost their jobs, homes, and even custody of their children. Instead of making us the safest city in America, this over-use of detention destabilized communities.How are we using detention today? Generally, people are held in jail for any number of reasons. Therefore, unfortunately, there is no simple answer to the question of "who is in our jail?" This report aims to advance an important public conversation about how we are using our jail and how it impacts safety in our city

The Price of Jails: Measuring the Taxpayer Cost of Local Incarceration

Jails are far more expensive than previously understood, as significant jail expenditures -- such as employee salaries and benefits, health care and education programs for incarcerated people, and general administration -- are paid for by county or municipal general funds, and are not reflected in jail budgets. Drawing on surveys from 35 jail jurisdictions from 18 states, this report determined that even the jurisdictions themselves had difficulty pinning down the total cost of their local jail or jail system. It also highlights how the surest way to safely cut costs is to reduce the number of people who enter and stay in jails. In doing so, jurisdictions will be able to save resources and make the investments necessary to address the health and social service needs of their communities, which have for too long landed at the doorstep of their jails

Overlooked: Women and Jails in an Era of Reform

Since 1970, there has been a nearly five-fold increase in the number of people in U.S. jails—the approximately 3,000 county or municipality-run detention facilities that primarily hold people arrested but not yet convicted of a crime. Despite recent scrutiny from policymakers and the public, one aspect of this growth has received little attention: the shocking rise in the number of women in jail.Women in jail are the fastest growing correctional population in the country—increasing 14-fold between 1970 and 2014. Yet there is surprisingly little research on why so many more women wind up in jail today. This report examines what research does exist on women in jail in order to begin to reframe the conversation to include them. It offers a portrait of women in jail, explores how jail can deepen the societal disadvantages they face, and provides insight into what drives women's incarceration and ways to reverse the trend

Philadelphia's Less Crowded, Less Costly Jails: Taking Stock of a Year of Change and the Challenges That Remain

Examines factors behind the 2009-10 decrease in Philadelphia's jail population; strategies for managing pretrial, sentenced, and probation or parole violator populations; and policies for further streamlining court processes and reducing jail populations

Jailing Communities: The Impact of Jail Expansion and Effective Public Safety Strategies

Communities are bearing the cost of a massive explosion in the jail population which has nearly doubled in less than two decades, according to a report released by the Justice Policy Institute (JPI). The research found that jails are now warehousing more people--who have not been found guilty of any crime -- for longer periods of time than ever before. The research shows that in part due to the rising costs of bail, people arrested today are much more likely to serve jail time before trial than they would have been twenty years ago, even though crime rates are nearly at the lowest levels in thirty years. "Crime rates are down, but you're more likely to serve time in jail today than you would have been twenty years ago," said report co-author Amanda Petteruti. "Jail bonds have skyrocketed, so that means if you're poor, you do time. People are being punished before they're found guilty -- justice is undermined."The report, Jailing Communities: The Impact of Jail Expansion and Effective Public Safety Strategies, found jail population growth (22 percent), is having serious consequences for communities that are now paying tens of billions yearly to sustain jails. Jails are filled with people with drug addictions, the homeless and people charged with immigration offenses. The report concludes that jails have become the "new asylums," with six out of 10 people in jail living with a mental illness.The impact of increased jail imprisonment is not borne equally by all members of a community. New data reveal that Latinos are most likely to have to pay bail, have the highest bail amounts, are least likely to be able to pay and, by far, the least likely to be released prior to trial. African Americans are nearly five times as likely to be incarcerated in jails as whites and almost three times as likely as Latinos. Further exacerbating jail crowding problems is the increase in the number of people being held in jails for immigration violations -- up 500 percent in the last decade.In 2004, local governments spent a staggering $97 billion on criminal justice, including police, the courts and jails. Over$19 billion of county money went to financing jails alone. By way of comparison, during the same time period, local governments spent just $8.7 billion on libraries and only$28 billion on higher education."These counties just cannot afford to invest the bulk of their local public safety budget in jails, and we are beginning to see why -- the more a community relies on jails, the less it has to invest in education, employment and proven public safety strategies," says Nastassia Walsh, co-author of the report.Research shows that places that increased their jail populations did not necessarily see a drop in violent crimes. Falling jail incarceration rates are associated with declining violent crime rates in some of the country's largest counties and cities, like New York City

A Comparison of Fiscal Consequences for Tax and Expenditure Limitation Proposals

Parameters from site visits to eight rural counties were used to estimate 1997 jail costs. Jail capacities ranged from five to 41 prisoners. The sample of jails exhibited a U-shaped cost curve. Costs varied by $21.43 per prisoner day, from a low of$35.20 per prisoner day for the 10 bed jail to $56.63 per prisoner day for the 40 bed jail. The threshold economies of size achieved by smaller jails was due primarily to (1) the shared staffing systems for jail operations and law enforcement and (2) the provision of less jail space per inmate. Costs for the rural county jails were also compared to costs for larger county jails and state prisons. Given the cost variations found in this study, a variety of inmate housing strategies are potentially feasible. The feasibility depends on the specific circumstances found in a given regional market.

State Operated Jails: How and Why

A revised version of this paper was published as: Schafer, N.E. (1994). "State Operated Jails: How and Why." American Jails 8(4): 35–44 (Sep/Oct 1994). (Not available online.)From the 1931 Wickersham Commission through the 1967 President's Commission and the 1973 National Advisory Commission, criminal justice experts and observers have recommended that state governments assume responsibility for jail operations. Currently six states operate jails: Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Rhode Island and Vermont. An examination of jail operations in these states shows that history and tradition as well as geography and politics form the impetus for state assumption of jail operations.[Introduction] / Background / The Six States: The Eastern States (Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, Delaware); Our Newest States (Alaska, Hawaii) / Discussion / Reference

Sanctuary in the Richmond City Jail

The following article is a collaboration among four individuals about unique programs run through “The Sanctuary” at the Richmond City Jail in Virginia, US. The Richmond City Jail is one of few jails in the US to offer programs to inmates who serve only short sentences as compared to prisons where the incarcerated serve much longer. In addition to this anomaly, students from outside of the jail come inside to take college classes with the inmates. Programs include literature classes, yoga, religious studies, creative writing, and more. The article explores the impact of The Sanctuary on the spirit, confidence, and perceptions of self-worth among inmates as compared to incarceration without such programs. Practitioners may use the programs detailed as a model for other institutions and evidence of the success of community building and education inside jails and prisons

The Extravagance of Imprisonment Revisited

This report analyzes prison and jail populations in the US as a whole and in four key states -- California, Florida, New York, and Texas -- to determine 1) how many prisoners are nonserious offenders and what it costs to lock them up, 2) what proven effective alternatives are in use and what they cost, and 3) what savings could be realized if a portion of the nonserious offenders were sentenced to alternatives instead of prison and jail

Social Determinants of Health and What Mothers Say They Need and Want After Release From Jail.

Identifying the biopsychosocial needs of mothers who have been released from jail is critical to understanding the best ways to support their health and stability after release. In May through August 2014, we interviewed 15 mothers who had been released from an urban jail about their reentry experiences, and we analyzed transcripts for themes. Eight domains of community reentry emerged through analysis: behavioral health services, education, employment, housing, material resources, medical care, relationships with children, and social support. Participants defined barriers to successful reentry, which paralleled the social determinants of health, and shared suggestions that could be used to mitigate these barriers