Fundamental Change in the Justice System-Adam Gelb-Pew<\/strong><\/p>\n

DC Public Safety Radio<\/strong><\/p>\n

Http:\/\/media.csosa.gov<\/a><\/p>\n

Radio program at\u00a0http:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/audio\/2014\/07\/fundamental-change-justice-system-adam-gelb-pew\/<\/a><\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> From the nation\u2019s capital this is DC Public Safety. I\u2019m your host Leonard Sipes. Ladies and gentlemen, we got a treat for you today. Adam Gelb, the Director of the Pew Public Safety Performance Project. We\u2019re going to be talking about fundamental change within the criminal justice system. I want to read briefly from Adam\u2019s bio. Adam Gelb directs Pew\u2019s Public Safety Performance Project, which helps states 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 to seek a greater public safety return on their corrections spending. He also supervises a vigorous research portfolio that highlights strategies for reducing recidivism while cutting costs. Adam frequently speaks to the media about national trends and state innovations, that\u2019s why we have Adam by our microphones.<\/p>\n

And before we start the program, I think that Adam and Pew are probably the principle spokespeople for fundamental change within the criminal justice system in this country right now. There are a lot of groups out there that are doing wonderful things, Council of State Governments, Urban Institute, the US Department of Justice. Lots of organizations are really promoting a fundamental change within the criminal justice system. But it\u2019s Adam and Pew that seems to get the press and Adam and Pew that seem to get the notice, thus making Adam probably in my opinion the principle spokesperson for fundamental change within the criminal justice system. Adam Gelb, welcome to DC Public Safety.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Thank you very much, Len. It\u2019s great to be with you.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Do you disagree with me when I say that? Pew is on the forefront, Pew because it is Pew. It\u2019s not government so you don\u2019t have to be overly careful. Pew is out there leading fundamental change within the criminal justice system. Do you agree or disagree?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> You are very kind and generous. We are not doing any of the things that we\u2019re doing without the partnerships with the organizations that you mentioned.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Of course.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And it\u2019s terrific to be part of what really now is a movement \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> To fundamentally change the criminal justice system and I think we\u2019re seeing that happen.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Len, we are almost upon the 20^{th<\/sup> anniversary of the Crime Bill signing, right, back in 1994?<\/p>\n}

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Uh huh.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> There was an historic landmark piece of legislation passed of more police \u2013 you remember the 100,000 police \u2013?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Sure.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And Midnight basketball prevention?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> But also 7.9 billion dollars that the federal government put out for states to increase their prison populations. And here we are 20 years later, a lot of prisons have built, right, we got to a point in 2008 where 1 out every 100 adults in this country was behind bars \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And 1 out of every 31 was on some form of correctional, under some form of correctional control. No doubt increased incarceration helped reduce the crime rate over this period and nobody \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And there\u2019s been an almost continuous 20 year reduction in crime.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s right. And nobody really challenges the notion that increased incarceration helped achieve some of that crime reduction. But the best research on the question shows that about 30%, maybe a third of the crime drop, can be attributable to increased incarceration, the rest has come from other things, and also significant consensus now that we\u2019re past the tipping point, where more and more incarceration is not the best way to reduce crime.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> There\u2019s bipartisan support now across the board in terms of both sides of the aisle, so the issue was not a Republican issue, it\u2019s not a Democratic issue. There is really significant support from both sides. Every governor in this country has had a conversation with their state corrections administrator in terms of you got to control correctional cost. Criminological associations, organizations have basically said, we think that there\u2019s a better fairer, more just, more productive, smarter way of conducting the criminal justice system, of doing business within the criminal justice system. And that in essence is the heart and soul of what Pew has tried to do, in bring a smarter, better databased approach to fundamental change.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s absolutely right. There is now consensus, broad political consensus on issues that used to be among the most divisive in American politics.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And just quickly think about this. Back in 1994 when the Crime Bill was being debated \u2013 I just want to us an example here of how things have changed \u2013 there was a young congressman named John Kasich from Ohio, who was one of the chief negotiators on the Crime Bill at the time, and there was a big debate in terms of the prison section of that bill about what the money would be used for, and the debate came down to two words. The two words were \u201cand programs\u201d. And the question was. Was all this money, the 7.9 billion dollars, going to be for facilities, bricks and mortar, or for facilities and programs? And the final bill ended up being all about bricks and mortar. Then Representative John Kasich and the Republican leadership had their way on that issue and the money turned out to be all for brick-and-mortar. Now flash-forward 20 years, John Kasich is the now the governor of Ohio, and, along with the Council of State Governments and the Justice Department and help from our project and the Justice reinvestment Initiative, that state has undertaken a very comprehensive set of reforms to try to make sure that prisons are for career and violent criminals and that lower level, nonviolent offenders are steered into more effective alternatives. Ohio has a long way to go, but the state has made some significant changes under the leadership of Governor Kasich, and he\u2019s very proud of making that move. And so to see the contrast, were we were 20 years ago during the Crime Bill debate and where we are today is rather dramatic.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> How many states are we talking about the Pew and allied organizations have worked with?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> I\u2019d say about 30 states.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> It\u2019s about 30 states. So it\u2019s most of the states in the United States.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s how that \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Needless to say. Yes.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s how that works.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> That\u2019s how that works. And so but think about that, that\u2019s significant. I mean when you started this whole thing it was really a lot of uncertainty. Now you have 30 states behind your belt. And these states are doing a data analysis, looking at every aspect of the criminal justice system, trying to figure out if there\u2019s a way of doing it smarter through data, keeping the people who are at obvious risk to public safety, but doing quote, unquote \u201csomething else with everybody else\u201d.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> I think you\u2019re putting finger on one of the keys to why we\u2019re seeing as many states make as dramatic changes as they are, and that is because the justice reinvestment approach is based on data and research. There is not an imperative here through this initiative to get rid of mandatory minimums or to divert all first and second time drug offenders, which you may or may not have an opinion on, but that\u2019s not the approach. The approach is on a state by state basis roll up your sleeves, dig into the data, see what it shows about what the specific drivers are of the prison population in that state. And as you can imagine over 30 states there\u2019ve been all kinds of different particular policies, statutes that are driving the prison population. In one state, which happens to be state where you go to state prison for any offence that carries 90 days or more, one of the leading drivers of state prison beds was driving with a suspended license. And so when you take an approach that is based on data and research, and not on emotion and ideology, you can find some common ground and consensus.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Okay. One of the things we want to talk about\u00a0 <\/span>today are people coming out of the prison system unsupervised. Now, there\u2019s been an increase per your research and per research from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, from the US Department of Justice, there is data that basically says that more people are coming out of the prison system unsupervised. My sense is, is that some people would say, \u201cWell, so what?\u201d What is the answer to \u201cso what\u201d?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Well, I\u2019ll just say, overall the trend is in the right direction, right, as we\u2019ve just been talking about, lots of states doing data analysis and identifying smarter ways to do sentencing corrections policy. This trend you just mentioned is a little bit of a counterweight to that, it\u2019s a little bit of a wind blowing in the opposite direction, and that is that a large and increasing number of offenders are serving out their prison sentences to the very last day and then being released to the streets without supervision. Back in 1990 it was about 1 in 7, about 14% of offenders were coming out that way, maxing out without supervision, and we found, unfortunately, that up through 2012 that had now increased to about 1 in 5.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Actually 22% of offenders now being released without supervision.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Why the increase?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Yeah. So product of a number obviously of different states, of different policies in specific, but really at the end of the day a prevailing attitude or philosophy that the best way to reduce crime would be to lock up as many people and hold them for as long as possible. And so it\u2019s decisions by legislatures, in terms of restricting discretion of parole boards and other releasing authorities on the back end, and then decisions by parole boards, that rather than put our names behind the release of a particular inmate, it\u2019s safer for everybody to hold that inmate till the very end of his or her sentence. And so a combination of factors led to it. What we\u2019re seeing now, and this is very encouraging, is several states realizing this does not make sense for public safety. It does not make sense to hold somebody to the very last day of their sentence and then release them to the streets with no supervision. This is somebody who, right, who would\u2019ve been institutionalized in some cases for a number of years, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And then expect to succeed \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> When they get back home without any instruction, supervision \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> One day they\u2019re in prison, one day they\u2019re on the street and \u2013<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Support \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Accountability or anything of the kind. And that if you\u2019re serious about public safety the better thing to do is to make sure that there\u2019s a period of supervision that\u2019s carved out of that prison term. And we have about eight states in just the last couple years that have passed mandatory reentry supervision policies that essentially require inmates to be released before their sentence is expired to ensure there\u2019s a period of transition and supervision.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Now, parole, historically parole has done a lot better than those people who are mandatorily released. They\u2019ve done a lot better. There\u2019s been up to a 20% difference. In most years it\u2019s a 15% to 20% difference between those paroled. The discretionary release based upon a person doing well within the prison system, obeying the rules, engaging in program and coming up versus those people who are, that none of that happens, the person just maxes out, whether they\u2019re supervised or unsupervised. Now, parole and supervision seems to have a positive effect based upon that data and that data alone.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Yeah. That\u2019s right. And this is a tricky issue, because people who max out may be maxing out because they are misbehaving \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Behind the walls \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And they\u2019re not completing programs or they\u2019re assaulting guards, and in those cases, right, I think everybody sort of agrees, you want those people to spend more time behind bars \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Still. And this is the case in particular even for inmates who are in solitary confinement. We see corrections professionals and policymakers saying even those people you don\u2019t want them to be released to the streets without supervision. What sense does that make either? And so most of the states are carving out a period of supervision to make sure that it\u2019s there; a couple of states have said we want to tack on this supervision period at the end, of course that\u2019s difficult because of the funding. And really I think, Len, at this point policymakers are starting to realize and the public certainly realizes, and our polling shows this, that it doesn\u2019t really matter whether somebody gets out in June or July. People at this point understand we\u2019re not going to build our way to public safety and that the most important thing is that the system does a better job reducing crime, right? We have 87%, 90% of voters will respond favorably when asked the question, \u201cDoes it matter to you more whether somebody spends a longer time behind bars or that whenever it is that they do get out that they\u2019re supervised adequately so they don\u2019t commit another crime.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> But the bottom line is you want them supervised. So the research, your polling, criminologically speaking they\u2019re better supervised. It\u2019s better then \u2013 instead of one day in solitary, the next day on M Street. How do we expect that person to successfully reintegrate in society without any help, without any assistance, without any place to go to?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s right. And we presented some research in this report, our max out report that you mentioned, from both Kentucky and New Jersey that shows that outperform max-outs, they\u2019re less likely to return to prison for new crimes. Unfortunately the cost savings isn\u2019t as great as it might be because some of them are returned to prison for technical violations.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Breaking the rules of their supervision. But their rates of crime commission are lower. And in the New Jersey, in particular, we were able to control for risk. So the issues we mentioned a minute ago, which is that somebody who\u2019s maxing out might be higher risk, say, than a parolee, well, this research actually controlled for that and compared similar risk offenders who maxed out to similar risk offenders who were put under supervision, and those offenders who were under supervision by New Jersey parole returned to prison 36% less frequently for new crimes than the max-outs do.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Okay. But California, the California Realignment is such an odd duck compared to what\u2019s happening in the other 49 states, I realize that. And realignment in California, ladies and gentlemen, if you don\u2019t know, is the idea of sentencing individuals to local jails for crimes that ordinarily would\u2019ve gone to state prisons and also releasing massive numbers of offenders. Every time I look the number seems to change, but somewhere in the ballpark of 30 to 40,000 people coming out of the prison system and being supervised locally instead of the state parole. So the bottom line there is that they did release a bunch of people with a no-cut contract, that unless you committed a new crime, they were unsupervised, and they wanted that to happen. They sort of felt that if they were supervised more people would end upcoming back, better than not being supervised at all and better than only coming back if they had committed a new crime. So there\u2019s an example where people are releasing people unsupervised and they think it\u2019s a good thing.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Right. Our report calls for universal post-prison supervision. The point you make and what was recognized in California some time ago is that there are some people who, for some combination of reasons, come out the back door of the prison gate and they\u2019re fairly low-risk. And you on your show have highlighted many times the research that says you don\u2019t want to over-supervise low-risk people, right?<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> You\u2019re going to make them worse. You\u2019re going to put conditions on them that are just too difficult for them to meet. You\u2019re going to have them in programs with other offenders who they shouldn\u2019t be consorting with and building relationships with people they shouldn\u2019t be hanging out with and so on. So while there\u2019s a call for universal post-prison supervision, like with everything, there needs to be some flexibility and a safety valve here to make sure that the state would have flexibility to determine that some inmates in fact should not be really actively supervised but could be on an administrative case load or some other way to make sure they don\u2019t reoffend.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Our guest is Adam Gelb. Halfway through the program, and these programs with Adam fly by very quickly. Adam Gelb, Director of the Pew Public Safety Performance Project, talking about fundamental change within the criminal justice system, in this particular program talking about unsupervised offenders. Now, they\u2019re coming out unsupervised in states because of, and I still have been struggling with this reason, we know that they do better upon supervision, but even that\u2019s been a controversial issue within criminological circles. There are a lot of people who say that there\u2019s very little difference between supervision and no supervision in parole and probation. And what they\u2019re saying is it\u2019s the programs that make the difference, not the supervision. So are we talking about coming out of prison not just unsupervised but without assistance? Is that the principle concern?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Yeah. There was nothing in our broad national research that identified, right, the components of effective supervision, but, as you\u2019re well aware, lots of research has and there are many different aspects of, right, what makes an effective supervision scheme. We don\u2019t want to do a lecture on this now, but I would highlight a couple things. It goes back to the beginning of our conversation. And what we see out in the states working with corrections and parole officials, working with state legislators and other policymakers are the following. There have been tremendous advances in how we do risk assessment. It wasn\u2019t anywhere near the kind of science 20, 30 years ago that it is today, right?<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Correct.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> So we know so much better about how to identify and sort offenders by risk level, high, medium, or low, and also what, right, what the criminogenic risk factors are, and then how to target the interventions to individuals offenders\u2019 criminal risk factors. We also \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Being smarter about making the decisions of what we do with people on community supervision.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Absolutely.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Yeah.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And then we know what programs are more likely to work with the offender population and in particular a cognitive behavioral therapy, right?<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Sure.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> This is a move away from sitting around in a group and talking about your problems, which has some value. But the research is really pretty clear that a cognitive behavioral approach and really breaking down what are the triggers that in people\u2019s lives provoke them to use drugs or do other things they shouldn\u2019t be doing and try to come up with strategies, just very practical strategies for avoiding the people, the places, and the things \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Sure.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That get them into trouble.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Drug treatment \u2013<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> You know more about \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Mental health, job assistance \u2013<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And how to specifically do those things effectively, because, right, we don\u2019t want to talk about \u2013 all those things aren\u2019t effective. You can\u2019t just say we\u2019re going to do job assistance and that is going to work, or drug treatment, right?<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> There\u2019s a lot more knowledge about how to make those broad buckets of programs effective. And then finally, and this is something that, Len, you have pioneered in your career, is the electronic monitoring piece did not exist back in the day, but whether it\u2019s GPS or rapid result drug tests or ATM like kiosks that low level offenders can report to rather than taking up the time of a supervision officer, these are technologies that are not only efficient, but they\u2019re giving policymakers and judges and prosecutors I think more confidence that there\u2019s a credible alternative to prison for appropriate offenders.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And if you put it all together these programs do have a way of reducing recidivism, do have a way of reducing the return to the prison system, so it\u2019s a win-win situation for everybody. There\u2019s fewer crimes, less money that states have to spend on their corrections budgets, and they can take some of that money and redirect it in other directions, whether it was restorative justice with the idea of saying, \u201cHey, fine. You\u2019ve saved me 15 million dollars. We\u2019re going to invest 7 million of that 15 million in terms of programs for people under supervision.\u201d or building bridges and taking care of older people or building schools or that sort of thing. So it seems to be a win-win situation for everybody. So, again, I go back to the question. If it\u2019s a win-win situation for everybody, if we now have these tools, we now have this understanding, we\u2019re in 30 states and 30 states are using data to make good decisions, how come the rate of unsupervised offenders is going up?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> There, as you know, there are so many facets of the criminal justice system, there\u2019re sentencing laws, there\u2019re release laws and policies, there\u2019re practices throughout the system, and this is one piece that has lagged behind the others. I think our report has shed some light on it and we\u2019ll hopefully accelerate attention to it and try to make sure that more and more states are looking at their own situations. There\u2019s tremendous variance, by the way, here in the state max-out rates, right? We talked about the overall national rate being 22%. But Florida has the highest max-out rate with 64% –<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Yeah.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Of inmates, right?<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Almost two out of three inmates in Florida maxing out their prison terms, down to the opposite end of the scale, which is Oregon, which has almost no one \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Maxing out. So this is on a state by state basis something that needs to be part of what officials who are serious about public safety and serious about containing the cost of corrections in overall government spending need to look at.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> But to be powerful, to really have the results that we\u2019re looking for in terms of people under supervision, you have to have the programs, you have to have the caseloads, you have to have the tools, you\u2019ve got to have the mechanisms in place to really do both supervision and programming, and a lot of states don\u2019t. Bill Burrell, an independent parole and probation consultant is coming before these microphones in a couple weeks to talk about his concern that states are being underfunded, and this whole revolution that\u2019s occurring within the criminal justice system, in many ways thanks to Pew and thanks to your leadership, may be at risk because states aren\u2019t providing enough funding for programs and for supervision and not providing the tools necessary to do a good job, to supervise people, to reduce crime, to lessen the rate of return back to the prison system. That seems to be his concern and the concern of many others.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> It\u2019s a very valid concern and everybody involved in this work has the exact same concern. Some states have been very aggressive about reinvesting prison savings into supervision, others less so. But as a general matter, hundreds of millions of dollars have been plowed back into supervision coming out of the sentencing and release law and policy changes. And I think there\u2019s a growing awareness that the parole and probation systems are the backbone of this system and that they need to be adequately funded.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And that\u2019s a fundamental sea change. When you and I were in the state of Maryland I remember asking the people within Parole and Probation, I said, \u201cWhat is the role of parole and probation?\u201d and their response was to enforce the dictates of the court and enforce the dictates of the Parole Commission. There was nothing there about reducing recidivism, there was nothing there about gaining a bigger bang for the tax paid dollar. It was simply to follow the rules. And at one point when we were with the state of Maryland, 70% of the intakes in one particular year were parole and probation violations. So there\u2019s no way a state prison system can operate efficiently if 70% of your parole probation, if 70% of the intakes are parole and probation failures. There\u2019s got to be a better way of doing it. That\u2019s why there\u2019s a bit of a dichotomy. There\u2019s a bit of a struggle, there\u2019s a bit of frustration. We had this consensus, we have Pew, we have all these organizations that are pushing for fundamental change, fundamental change is happening, yet parole and probation still seems to be short-funded or shortchanged.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> I think almost any agency of government is always going to claim that it is underfunded. That said there are lots of new dollar flowing in the direction of these agencies and a rising awareness of their role as part of the crime fighting machinery in the states. We see in state after state, really changing the culture of the conversation around here and it\u2019s sort of based on two things. One is the growing awareness of the research that shows that supervision can work if it\u2019s done well.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And there really is a growing awareness among policymakers of that research. And the National \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> It\u2019s a sea change.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> The National Governor\u2019s Association, the National Conference of State Legislatures, the National Center for State Courts, as well as the partners that you\u2019ve mentioned, the Justice Department, Council of State Governments, Justice Center, the Bureau Institute on Justice, there are a lot organizations providing information to policymakers about this and it\u2019s starting to sink in. So on that side there is growing recognition of credible alternatives. The flip-side of that is that more and more people seem to think that prisons are essentially schools for crime, and particularly on the conservative side here a lot of the conservative voices are saying, \u201cThis makes no sense and how can we expect large government bureaucracies that put a bunch of criminals together to turn out people who are corrected?\u201d And so there\u2019s growing, at the same time as there\u2019s growing confidence in alternatives, there\u2019s growing skepticism that prison will actually accomplish that recidivism reduction that some folks once thought they would.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Final four minutes of the program. There has been a sea change in terms of both of our careers, where we are in terms of people coming out of the prison system, what happens to them, how they\u2019re supervised, how they\u2019re assisted. The conversation has changed completely. What does the future hold? Where are we going within the next five years in terms of a fundamental change within the criminal justice system?<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> Great question. And I don\u2019t have a crystal ball here, but I\u2019ll give you \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> But you\u2019re leading the charge so guess.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> I\u2019ll give you some thoughts. It is a mystery to many people why the prison population has leveled off and started to fall in the context of a sour economy. And it\u2019s nice to see the economy picking back up again at the extent to which you want to think there\u2019s a relationship between the crime rate and the economic situation. That\u2019s a myth that has been challenged, drastically, right? It\u2019s been \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Sure.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> It\u2019s been almost a full six years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers and the start of the Great Recession, and we have seen a sort of plateauing of the crime drop. It\u2019s, it continues down slightly, not at the same rate it had been.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> But from a longitudinal point of view it has plummeted \u2013<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> It is way down.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And for the last four years there\u2019s been a decrease in admissions to prisons.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s right. So from that perspective it looks like the population will continue to head down. A lot of these reforms that the states that we\u2019ve been talking about have done really are just starting to kick in. I mean the last, really the last two or three years the states have gotten even more aggressive about some of the reforms that they\u2019re embarking on, changing property crime statutes, changing the penalties for drug offences, diverting more offenders, reducing length of stay, incentivizing offenders to comply with supervision so that they can earn their way off sooner, which is another way of creating resources \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Sure.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> For supervision. Not more dollars, but it\u2019s reducing caseloads by getting these low-risk offenders off of those caseloads, etc. So for those reasons I think we\u2019re going to start to see the population go down. There\u2019s something else afoot here, Len, that we don\u2019t have good measures for yet that we need to start tracking, and that is not just the quantity of offenders behind bars, but, if you will, the quality.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> Right.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> And what a lot of these reforms are designed to do is not necessarily explicitly reduce the prison population itself, but to make sure that the prison beds are occupied by truly dangerous offenders, by the violent career criminals.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> The people posing the highest risk to public safety.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> That\u2019s right. And this is what governors and legislative leadership want to talk about, they want to talk about making sure the taxpayer dollars funding these expensive prison cells are being used for serious chronic and violent offenders. And we need to start having some more measures that look at whether that\u2019s true, whether that\u2019s actually happening. And I think it is. When you look at the changes in the sentencing and release laws and policies for nonviolent offenders and changes in policies we\u2019re dealing with, technical violators on supervision, I think we\u2019re starting to see a lot of states change the complexion, the composition of their prison populations, and we will see over time a significant increase in the \u2013<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> We both agree that there has been a huge change and a very positive change in terms of the conversation about what we do with the criminal justice system.<\/p>\n

ADAM GELB:<\/b> There really has. It\u2019s a very exciting time in this field.<\/p>\n

LEONARD SIPES:<\/b> And a very exciting time because of the work of Pew and the partners. Ladies and gentlemen, we\u2019ve been talking to Adam Gelb, Director of the Pew Public Safety Performance Project, talking about fundamental change within the criminal justice system. And, ladies and gentlemen, we really do appreciate your comments, we really do appreciate your criticisms, and we want everybody have themselves a very, very pleasant day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fundamental Change in the Justice System-Adam Gelb-Pew DC Public Safety Radio Http:\/\/media.csosa.gov Radio program at\u00a0http:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/audio\/2014\/07\/fundamental-change-justice-system-adam-gelb-pew\/ LEONARD SIPES: From the nation\u2019s capital this is DC Public Safety. I\u2019m your host Leonard Sipes. Ladies and gentlemen, we got a treat for you today. Adam Gelb, the Director of the Pew Public Safety Performance Project. We\u2019re going to […]<\/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":[23,54,15,18,21],"tags":[267,266],"class_list":["post-1189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audiopodcast","category-corrections-prisons","category-interviewswithpolicymakers","category-reentry","category-whatworks","tag-adam-gelb","tag-change-in-criminal-justice","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pBoKk-jb","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189","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=1189"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1267,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1189\/revisions\/1267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.csosa.gov\/podcast\/transcripts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}