http:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/audio\/2013\/11\/systematic-change-criminal-justice-pew-public-safety-performance-project\/<\/a><\/p>\n[Audio Begins]<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: From the nation\u2019s capital this is DC Public Safety. I\u2019m your host Leonard Sipes. Ladies and gentlemen, our title for today\u2019s show: Public Opinion, Sentencing, and Parole and Probation. We\u2019re very happy to have Adam Gelb. Adam is the Director of the Public Safety Performance Project, which helps advance policies and practices in adult and juvenile sentencing and corrections that protect public safety, hold offenders accountable and control correctional costs. As project lead, Adam oversees Pew\u2019s assistance to states and also research. He\u2019s been involved in crime control and prevention for the past 25 years as a journalist, congressional aide, a senior state government official. He graduated from the University of Virginia, and holds a master\u2019s degree from Harvard University\u2019s Kennedy School of Government. Adam, welcome to DC Public Safety.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Great to be with you, Len.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Full disclosure. Adam and I worked together in the state of Maryland when he was a senior aide to the lieutenant governor, who eventually ran for governor. And I was leading public information for a state agency, law enforcement and correctional agency. So Adam and I have worked together. I\u2019ve seen Adam lead this charge in person. Nobody is a more passionate person and a more knowledgeable person on the issue of crime and justice. I want to read very quickly from one of the findings from Pew, in terms of the research that they do. \u201cAmerican voters believe that too many people are in prison and the nation spends too much on prison. Voters overwhelmingly support a variety of policy changes that shift non-violent offenders from prison to more effective, less expensive alternatives.\u201d Number three. \u201cSupport for sentencing and correction reforms, including reduced prison terms, is strong across political parties, regions, age, gender, and racial and ethnic groups.\u201d Adam, the whole idea of Pew and the Public Safety Performance Project, give me a definition in one sentence.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: You said it very well yourself, right?<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Yeah, I did, but I \u2013<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We have \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: We need to hear from you, in one sentence.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We help states advance policies and practices that protect public safety, hold offenders accountable, and control corrections costs.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: When you and I talked in the past and I say, \u201cAdam, this whole issue of offender reentry.\u201d You said, \u201cLeonard, we\u2019re not an offender reentry program. We\u2019re about systematic policy change within the criminal justice system; within the United States. That does the things that you just articulated.\u201d Correct?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s right, yeah. Our project does look at the bigger system than just the very tail end of the system and making sure that when offenders get out of prison they\u2019re set up for success.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We look at the whole system from front end to back end, and, right, the bulk of what we do is join into partnerships with states. When the governor, senior legislative leadership, the chief justice, and judicial leaders, say, \u201cWe\u2019ve got a problem here, we\u2019d like to take a look at it, see what we can do about bending the curve on our corrections growth and making sure that prisons are holding the right people.\u201d And then we come in, and working with a bipartisan, inner branch taskforce, take a look at the state\u2019s data. What specifically is driving the population, what\u2019s caused it to rise? We also do a look at the corrections and reentry policies. To what extent is that agency or agencies implementing what we know to be evidence based practices? Based on that, and at only at that point, once we\u2019ve taken a look at the data and the trends, do we then start to fashion policy solutions. And based on what the research says about what works, based on what other state experiences have been about what works or not, then we help the state put together a set of policy recommendations. And then thirdly, and this is really important about what we do, is that we don\u2019t just help the state and that taskforce put together a nice pretty report with fancy graphs and great recommendations that\u2019s going to sit on the shelf. All right, there\u2019s an integral involvement of all the stakeholder groups and agencies from the get-go, and certainly the governor and the legislative leadership. And so our reports tend to make it across the finish line in the legislature and not sit on a shelf.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: What you\u2019re looking for is systematic change at the state level. You\u2019re looking for systematic policy changes that reduce cost to state yet at the same time improve public safety.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s exactly right.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: All right. And through that \u2013 and I\u2019m going to say this, and it\u2019s not my opinion. I\u2019m not expressing my opinion at all. I\u2019ve talked to a wide variety of people at the national level, at the state level. Some people believe \u2013 again, I represent the federal government. I work with a lot of federal agencies. I do not mean to embarrass them. I love them half to death. But a lot of people express the opinion that Pew is not a leader in this issue of systematic change within the criminal justice system, Pew is the leader. Pew writes material in such a way that the average person can understand it, the average member of the general assembly, that person\u2019s aide; citizens can understand what it is that you\u2019re talking about. You have a wonderful flow in your writing. You have a comprehensive strategy in terms of your media events, of the video that you create. There\u2019s something very, very strategic in terms of the way that you communicate. You communicate in a way that government seems to be incapable of doing. Am I right or wrong?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Well, we have a few advantages there, both in terms of resources and in terms of the politics, right? Pew is an independent organization that\u2019s self-funded to do this work and so we do have a little bit more freedom to be creative in the way that we communicate.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: And government cannot. That\u2019s the interesting thing. People have simply said Pew can, that\u2019s the answer they\u2019ve given, that Pew has the ability to communicate, government has an innate inability to communicate.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Well, take the polling that you started off the segment with here.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Right, right.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We are able to go out and partner with some of the top pollsters in this country. One of the top Republican pollsters and one of the Democratic pollsters team together on the poll that you mentioned and were able to document, with research and public opinion, where people are on this, right. And I think the point that you\u2019re making and one of the reasons why we\u2019re seeing so much change around the country at this point is that elected officials are, I think, finally catching up with where voters and citizens are on these issues. People are sick and tired of the revolving door.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: How many states are you talking about, that Pew is involved in?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: About half the states. Over the past seven years \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: So you\u2019re talking about 25 year \u2013 25 states over the course of the last seven years, systematic examination as to how they do business, systematic examination as to how they can change?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: 25 states in the United States and you\u2019ve been able to do that on a systematic basis.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We\u2019ve been working hard. We\u2019ve had a tremendous amount of help from our partners at the Council of State Government\u2019s Justice Center, the Vera Institute of Justice, the Crime and Justice Institute, and many others.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Office of Justice Programs, yes.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: BGA and the Office of Justice Programs, an integral partner in this effort. And it\u2019s been an amazing public-private partnership, particularly in that our strength and focus of our dollars can be on the front end of these reforms, trying to make sure that there is a solid policy package put together and making it across the finish line to legislature. And then BGA has been able to really come in after that and provide some support to these states to make sure that the changes, and there are lots of them in many of these comprehensive packages, are actually implemented. Because I think we all realize that a lot of this structural policy change that you\u2019re talking about sometimes isn\u2019t worth the paper that it\u2019s printed on unless there\u2019s real follow-through by the courts and by probation and parole agencies.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay. I do, just out of respect for Pew, is to get across the point that Pew is multilayered, Pew has been around for, what, 150,000 years, and multilayered, they do a lot of different things. It\u2019s really surprising how Pew is a daily part of my life as a bureaucrat within a federal agency in terms of daily news summary, in terms of the material that you give me, in terms of public opinion of polls, Pew is multilayered.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: It certainly is. There are projects in many different areas of public policy, health policy, environment policy, and it\u2019s been fabulous that the Institution has committed as much energy and resource as it has over the past seven years to an area that is not really commonly thought of in a lot of philanthropic circles.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay. Let\u2019s get down to the 25 states. Office of Justice Program, Bureau of Justice Assistance, Pew, Council of States, I mean the lot of organizations involved in terms of systematic change within states. I talk to reporters and reporters say, \u201cOkay, so this is all going on, this sense of systematic change at the state level. How many criminologists have we talked to over the course of our careers who said, \u201cI really believe that we should systematically do it differently,\u201d that we do over-incarcerate, that there should be more alternatives to incarceration? I contend that reporters and street cops are two of the most jaded groups of people on the face of the earth. They\u2019re cynical. They look at me and their question is, \u201cSo what? Show me the results as to where the alternatives, whatever they happen to be, that are truly having an impact in terms of reduced crime, and improved justice, and at the same time reductions in costs for the criminal justice system. Show me. Show me. Show me.\u201d When I respond, I run off a list of research that has had an impact, and their response is, \u201cOkay, that doesn\u2019t quite do it for me.\u201d Because most research projects when they are successful, not all are successful, run in the ballpark of about 15% reduction in recidivism. They\u2019re interested in a safer America. Can you deliver on a safer America?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: I think we\u2019re seeing governors and state legislators and judicial leaders across this country in those 25 states that have gone through the justice reinvestment process, I think we\u2019re seeing them deliver.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Right? And they are. And I hope it\u2019s well known with your audience that Texas was one of the first states to go through this kind of process, and that in Texas, in the last seven years, the prison population has stabilized. They expected to have to spend at this point now more than two billion dollars to accommodate the increased growth that they were projecting. They haven\u2019t had to spend that money. The recidivism rate, pro-revocation rate, in that state is down by well over a third. And public safety, the most important piece of this puzzle, has improved across the state. The crime rate in Texas is back down to where it was in the 1960s.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: And reporters are going to say, \u201cWell, Leonard, but most states have seen reductions in crime across the board.\u201d We\u2019re just coming off an almost continuous 20 year reduction in crime across the board, as measured by the FBI, as measured by the Bureau of Justice Statistics. However, for the last couple years, it\u2019s starting to go up, both on the property and violent crime. So the fact that there have been reductions in the past in any state can be explained, as a journalist would say, by the reductions in all states. So how do we through\u00a0 systematic change, prove that we\u2019re improving public safety, that we\u2019re making people\u2019s lives safer?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: I think the numbers clearly show it, right. There\u2019re national trends and then there are state by state trends. And what you really have to do if you want to examine this closely is take a look at Texas, take a look at South Carolina, take a look at Georgia, take a look at Ohio, and some of the other states that have made these changes. And what\u2019s clear is that they\u2019ve been able to save a tremendous amount of taxpayer money by not having to build and open and staff new prisons. And they\u2019ve been able to do so while continuing along with that general national trend towards lower crime over the past several years. And in the last couple years the numbers also sort of mirror the national average. So what\u2019s starting to happen, Len, is that there\u2019s the myth that incarceration and crime rates move together in some lock step. That myth is being shattered. It\u2019s being shattered in state after state across the country, where states that have reduced their incarceration rates have also reduced their crime rates. In fact the 29 states that have reduced their incarceration rates over the past few years, the crime rate has gone down in all of them but three.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: So and that\u2019s your point. The point is, is that there has been systematic change in these states if you\u2019re going to predict the fact that there\u2019s been less incarceration, that your crime rate has gone up, that hasn\u2019t happened.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: No it hasn\u2019t and \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: So it\u2019s gone down concurrently with a reduction within prison population?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: It has. And I think the conversation at the national level when you talk at sort of a big conceptual level, that it immediately does go toward, \u201cWell, what\u2019s the relationship between crime and incarceration?\u201d At the local level, the state level, what policy makers are starting to realize, when they\u2019ve seen, \u201cOkay, we\u2019re not building these prisons, okay, we\u2019re scaling this back and crime is going down.\u201d or it\u2019s maybe starting to tick up a little bit, nationally what\u2019s going on here? They start to look at other factors that influence the crime rate, particularly the police. And this is where, right, that you need to make sure, in part of these conversations, what\u2019s happened with the ranks of police forces across this country gets some time in that conversation. Because police forces have had to lay off, in some cases, tremendous portions of their \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Oh, in New Jersey there are towns that have laid off 50% of their people.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: So \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: It\u2019s been amazing what\u2019s going on throughout the country.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Right. So at the local level people are starting to see, this is not all just about how many people you put in prison and how long you keep them there, definitely one factor. Nobody in this conversation, in a serious conversation about these issues is going to argue that the increased imprisonment didn\u2019t have any impact on the reduction in crime.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: And that\u2019s a good point.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: What we\u2019re seeing now, though, is that most people, including policymakers, realizing that we have passed a tipping point on this. We\u2019ve long since now passed a point of diminishing returns, where not only will more prisons not necessarily reduce crime, they\u2019re just not even close to the most cost at more prisons, not close the most cost-effective way to reduce crime.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: I want to get very quickly to the other thing that I\u2019ve heard from reporters, this issue is principally a way for states to cut costs, not necessarily public safety, but a way to cut costs. But before I get to that I\u2019m going to reintroduce you. Adam Gelb is at our microphones today. He is the Director of the Public Safety Performance Project of Pew. And certainly Pew, as I said before, I\u2019m not quite sure that I can be more praise or suggest more praise for Pew than I possibly can. It is either the leader of change in the criminal justice system in this country or certainly a partner with a lot of other organizations in terms of systematic change within the criminal justice system within this country. www.pewpublicsafety.org, www.pewpublicsafety.org. The criticism that, \u201cLeonard, okay, so all these states are doing all these things because they\u2019re tired of spending so much money on incarceration and that\u2019s all you\u2019re doing. Yes, you\u2019re cutting costs and that\u2019s well documented, but they\u2019re doing it solely for that, they\u2019re not doing it for systematic change within the criminal justice system.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Budget trouble is definitely bringing states to the table; it\u2019s just not the meal.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Right? Policymakers across the country are not holding their noses and saying, \u201cI know this going to really cause an increase in crime and I hate to do it, but we do have to, at the state level, make ends meet, we have to balance our budget, so we\u2019re just going to have to make some of these tough policy calls.\u201d That is not what we see happening in state after state. What we do see happening are three things. First is they are seeing the success of states like Texas and South Carolina and other states that we just talked about, states that have significantly bent the curve on their prison growth, and even reduced population, and are seeing reduced recidivism because of the reinvestment into stronger probation and parole programs, and they\u2019re seeing those state crime rates go down. So they\u2019re starting to see this iron linkage broken between locking up more people and having safer streets. The second thing that\u2019s happening is they\u2019re becoming increasingly aware of where the public is on this and I think our polling has helped there; but more and more just in daily conversation you find that people realize at this point after 25, 30 years of ever increasing prison populations that we\u2019re not going to build our way to public safety and that there are much more effective and less expensive approaches for lower level offenders. They also are aware and think that they don\u2019t have some specific amount of time that they want to see offenders behind bars for. The want to see a high percentage of the sentence served, but they don\u2019t really care if that\u2019s a five year sentence or a three year sentence. They just want to know when the judge says three years; you\u2019re going to serve pretty much all that three years. That is starting to seep into some of these conversations. Other parts of the public opinion constellation here include victims speaking out and also saying, \u201cNow, this is not all about locking up as many people for as long as possible.\u201d This is, \u201cI realize these people are going to get out and I want them to pay restitution, I want them to be held accountable, but I also don\u2019t want them to claim new victims.\u201d And so we need to strengthen reentry. We have business leaders, Len, stepping forward in many of these states and saying this is now an issue just the overall economic vitality of the state. The corrections budgets have been the second fastest growing part of state budgets behind only Medicaid.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: That\u2019s what I want to explore.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: And this is not the right way to go. Let me just add that you certainly have a lot of conservative voices that you\u2019ve mentioned that are speaking up here now and realizing that having 1 in 100 adults behind bars is not consistent with conservative notions of limited government and fiscal discipline.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Let me get into that. For the first time in my over 40 years within the criminal justice system, I\u2019m seeing people on both sides of the political asile come together under one banner, under one topic, and that is, again, systematic change. Doing it differently, getting a better result for our criminal justice dollar. I\u2019ve not seen that before. I\u2019ve not seen some of the public opinion data that you\u2019re sharing swinging in the direction of, \u201cHey, let\u2019s not have 75%, 80% recidivism in terms of re-arrests, let\u2019s not have 50% recidivism in terms of re-incarceration. The state simply can\u2019t afford that. My God! We don\u2019t have money for schools; we don\u2019t have money for colleges. Can we reduce this rate of recidivism? Can we rearrange how we do things?\u201d I\u2019ve never seen such a coalescence of opinion from despaired groups before on this issue of crime and justice.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: There\u2019s a tremendous shift that\u2019s happening and it\u2019s hard to put your finger on exactly why it\u2019s happening. Why is Jeb Bush, why is Newt Gingrich, why are Grover Norquist, Bill Bennett, David Keene, why are these folks who are and have been leaders of the conservative movement coming forward now and saying the system has gotten too big, it\u2019s gotten too expensive, it needs to be rethought dramatically?<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: It needs to be more effective at what it does.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: And it really derives \u2013 right, the point in time is sort of what\u2019s hard to fix. The reasons behind it are not difficult to discern at all, right. One is straightforward limited government. 1 in 100 behind bars, almost 1 in 31 under some form of correctional supervision, prison, jail, probation, parole, it\u2019d be even a little higher if we counted pretrial. That is big and it\u2019s costly. And so that\u2019s one perspective, the limited government perspective and the fiscal discipline perspective. There\u2019re also big strains of this movement that look at the victim piece of this and recognize that serving time in a state prison does not do anything to help make that victim whole, particularly lower level property offenders, that it\u2019s more consistent with conservative notions of justice.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: The focus is violent offenders versus nonviolent offenders. And so much of this focus is looking at the nonviolent offenders and can we do, \u201cSomething else with the nonviolent offenders.\u201d? The violent offenders \u2013 we\u2019re basically making room for the more dangerous folks, are we not, in terms of this whole concept of effectiveness?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That is a constant theme in the States. What policymakers tell us they want to see out of the policy packages, and they certainly see this when they look at the data, in terms of increasing numbers of technical violators taking up prison space, is that\u2019s not who they want behind bars. They want behind bars the serious, the chronic, the violent, and the high-risk offenders.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay. We only have eight minutes left in the program. I want to ask a personal question and I want to move on to more policy issues. Number one, you\u2019ve ridden this horse from the very beginning, and I would imagine, as you\u2019re sitting on top of your horse, when started with Pew, when you\u2019re looking out at all you can see is 10,000 cattle milling about. And you\u2019re saying to yourself, \u201cIt\u2019s impossible to get all these critters moving in one direction.\u201d And you have. So what is your personal sense of accomplishment after all these years, or non-accomplishment?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: There are a lot of cynics who think that this is all about the budgets. As you just said, that we\u2019re really not adding a lot of value here, this would be happening anyway or it\u2019s happening only because the budgets. That there\u2019s really not some fundamental shift in the national conversation here and even if there is it\u2019ll be temporary and it won\u2019t last much longer beyond when budgets recover. That\u2019s not what we see happening. We do see a fundamental shift in the conversation and the perspective on this issue happening. We had for a long time a situation where policymakers thought it was the right approach to this issue and it was their job to say, \u201cHow do I demonstrate that I\u2019m tough on crime?\u201d<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Right.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Now what they\u2019re saying is, \u201cHow do I get taxpayers a better public safety return on their correction spending?\u201d And I think that\u2019s an important shift and it\u2019s one that\u2019ll last.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Give me five specifics. Because I think it was a very modest answer. I think I would\u2019ve been scared half to death sitting on top of that horse looking out at the sea of cattle that I\u2019m trying to get moving in one direction. I think you\u2019re being modest. Number two. And I think Pew is being modest. I think Pew should crow more about what it\u2019s done. I think it\u2019s been a sea change. Number two. Give me, and reporters ask me this all the time, give me the five fundamental changes that one needs to advocate for to provide a systematic change that reduces cost and improves public safety all at the same time. The first from a parole and probation perspective that I always give is to do an independent analysis of that individual to judge their risk to public safety and to judge what their need are so you\u2019re dealing with that person individually and not just as a class so you can design a program that will specifically deal with what it is that he or she needs. Risk and needs assessment. That\u2019s one of my answers, do you have others?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: There\u2019re many. To build off of what you were just saying. We do know now what works to stop the cycle recidivism. No magic bullets. No way to guarantee that somebody\u2019s not going to commit another crime. But we do know how to do risk assessment much better. We do have much better surveillance technology. We know \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: GPS, is that what we\u2019re talking about?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: We\u2019re talking about GPS; we\u2019re talking about rapid result drug tests.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: All right.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: So we know more about how to change behavior, we have better technologies to help us do that. We need to get \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: To better accountability tools?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Across the board.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: It\u2019s very different. The challenge is less so in terms of knowing what to do but in terms of actually getting it done.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Right.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: And what we\u2019re seeing in these states is the recognition that there are a good number of lower level offenders in the prison system, particularly those who are technical violators and not having committed a new crime or not been convicted of a new crime. And if you can change laws and practices about who goes in, and you can capture some of those savings and reinvest them into some of the probation and parole programs that follow the evidence based technologies then you can have a tremendous impact on both cost and on public safety.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: All right, so the state saves 20 million dollars, you want 10 of that reinvested in the programs, parole and probation or rehab programs or treatment programs that could have a direct impact on the rest of the people staying out of the criminal justice system.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s the formula.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay. What else?<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: One of the things that we\u2019re seeing a lot of interest in the states in is in swift and certain sanctions. The states are realizing that you have to hold people accountable \u2013<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Sanctions mean the guy under supervision screws up and you\u2019ve got to do something about it.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: There\u2019s an immediate and a swift response, but it\u2019s not severe. You don\u2019t wait until somebody violates 10, 12 times and then do something about it. There\u2019s a lot of interest in incentives, all right? For a long time the prison system has incentivized good behavior behind the walls by saying you could earn credits off your sentence. What we\u2019re seeing now is a lot of states interested in transferring that concept to the community and saying, \u201cIf you\u2019re out on probation or parole and you\u2019re doing what you\u2019re supposed to be doing, you\u2019re going to treatment, you\u2019re testing clean, and so on, you\u2019re paying your victim restitution, then you can earn time off your supervision period.\u201d And that does two things. It incentivizes good behavior by offenders in compliant behavior, and then it calls off the lower risk offenders off of case loads, right, so that supervision officers can actually spend their time on people who are not complying. And that\u2019s what research tells us is going to produce the biggest impact on public safety.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: People have suggested to me that we\u2019ve got to reduce the amount of time spent on parole and probation. If you have a person for five years on parole and probation that person\u2019s going to go back. You cannot, the pope could not live a clean life during an endless period on parole and probation. I apologize if I\u2019ve been disrespectful to anybody. Few could live five years on parole and probation without messing up, without the possibility of returning back to the system. So what some people suggest is that you tell the person, \u201cYou give me one good year of no violations, you work, no drug positives, you do all the things you\u2019re supposed to do. If you\u2019re a nonviolent offender, I\u2019ll go back, and then after a year of compliance, I\u2019ll go back and recommend that we no longer supervise you.\u201d But across the board, people are recommending lower times for supervision on parole and probation.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s right. I think practice is starting to catch up with the research on this question.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Anything else quickly? We\u2019ve got about 30 seconds left.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: Yeah, I think you were asking about interventions and programs.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Yes.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: I\u2019d like to really put the emphasis on the process.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: Okay.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: I think one of the reasons why states have been as successful as they have been working with us and CSG and others on this is that they have not put the cart before the horse. They\u2019ve taken a look at their data; they\u2019ve taken a look at their systems, and from that, determined what policies and programs are missing and what\u2019s the best fit. And that has just been an absolutely critical part of this process. It\u2019s changed the whole thing around from, \u201cWhat\u2019s a good program? Or what should we do ideologically?\u201d to \u201cWhat does the data say?\u201d<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: So if we\u2019re going to have systematic change we need systematic analysis. And that\u2019s where Pew, and BJA, and OJP, and the Center for State Governments, that\u2019s where they all come in.<\/p>\n
Adam Gelb: That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n
Len Sipes: All right. Adam, it\u2019s been a fascinating conversation. It went by way too fast as it always does. Adam Gelb is the director of the Public Safety Performance Project for Pew. www.pewpublicsafety.org, www.pewpublicsafety.org. Ladies and gentlemen, this is DC Public Safety. We appreciate your comments. We even appreciate your criticism. And we want everybody to have themselves a very, very pleasant day.<\/p>\n
[Audio Ends]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Welcome to \u201cDC Public Safety\u201d \u2013 Radio and television shows, blog and transcripts on crime, criminal offenders and the criminal justice system. The portal site for \u201cDC Public Safety\u201d is http:\/\/media.csosa.gov. Radio Program available at http:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/audio\/2013\/11\/systematic-change-criminal-justice-pew-public-safety-performance-project\/ [Audio Begins] Len Sipes: From the nation\u2019s capital this is DC Public Safety. I\u2019m your host Leonard Sipes. Ladies […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,53,54,4,9,52,18,21],"tags":[29,221,276],"class_list":["post-1091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audiopodcast","category-budget-issues","category-corrections-prisons","category-criminaljustice","category-education","category-parole-and-probation","category-reentry","category-whatworks","tag-criminal-justice","tag-pew-safety-performance-project","tag-reentry","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pBoKk-hB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1091"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1094,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1091\/revisions\/1094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}