In October 2015, the Governor, Chief Justice, Senate President Pro Tempore, House Speaker, and Department of Corrections Secretary requested support from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) and the Pew Charitable Trusts (Pew) to employ a justice reinvestment approach to build on prior successes. As public- private partners in the Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI) BJA and Pew approved Pennsylvania’s request and asked The Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center to provide intensive technical assistance to help collect and analyze data and develop appropriate policy options for the state that are designed both to increase public safety and reduce corrections spending.
Under the direction of the Justice Reinvestment Working Group, CSG Justice Center staff will conduct a comprehensive analysis of extensive data sets collected from various relevant state agencies and branches of government to build a broad picture of statewide and local criminal justice trends. Whereas the previous justice reinvestment effort focused on corrections and parole systems, this justice reinvestment project includes an explicit focus on crime, arrest, pretrial, sentencing, county probation and parole supervision, jails, substance use and mental disorders, and community-based treatment and programs to reduce recidivism. CSG Justice Center staff will also convene focus groups and lead interviews with people working on the front lines of Pennsylvania’s criminal justice system. Based on findings from these exhaustive quantitative and qualitative analyses, the working group will develop policy options for the General Assembly’s consideration in the 2017 legislative session.
Please check the box next to the following questions if the answer is 'yes'.
Please enter the applicable Event Date if there is an Event associated with this TTA.
When entering an Event Date, the Time is also required.
If the TTA is targeted to a particular audience or location, please complete the questions below.
Milestones are an element, activity, work product, or key task associated with completing the TTA (e.g. kick-off meeting, collect data from stake holders, deliver initial data analysis).
Please complete the fields below, if applicable, to create a milestone for this TTA.
In March, CSG Justice Center Staff presented at the first meeting of the Pennsylvania Justice Reinvestment Working Group, continued stakeholder engagement onsite and by phone, and began development of the next presentation to the working group.
CSG Justice Center staff presented initial analyses to the 36-member working group outlining the justice reinvestment process and examining some of the challenges facing Pennsylvania’s criminal justice system. Working group members include: Chairman (Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency), Secretary (Pennsylvania Department of Human Services), Representative from the Defender Association of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Attorney General, Secretary (Pennsylvania Board of Pardons), Victim Advocate (Office of Victim Advocate), Secretary (Office of the Budget), Secretary (Governor’s Office of Legislative Affairs), Presiding Blair County Judge, Allegheny County Court Administrator, Member (County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania), Leigh County Director of Corrections, Lebanon County Chief Probation Officer, Court Administrator of Pennsylvania, Deputy Secretary (Governor’s Office of Legislative Affairs), 17th District Senator, 55th District Representative, Secretary (Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs), Executive Director (Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing), Secretary (Governor’s Office of Policy and Planning), Director and Chief Public Defender of Allegheny County), 105th District Representative, Executive Director (Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency), Secretary (Pennsylvania Department of Corrections), Commissioner (Pennsylvania State Police), Chairman (Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole), Chief of Staff (Governor’s Office), Dauphin County District Attorney, General Counsel (Governor’s Office of General Counsel), Philadelphia County District Attorney, Executive Deputy Chief of Staff to the Governor, 12th District Senator, President (Pennsylvania Chiefs of Police Association), President (Fraternal Order of Police – Pennsylvania State Lodge), Executive Director (Juvenile Court Judges’ Commission), and President Judge of Pennsylvania County.
The presentation focused on the state’s sentencing practices, the volume of individuals incarcerated and on parole, and the impact of the system on counties. The meeting was held at the Governor’s Residence and was well attended by legislators, criminal justice stakeholders, and the media. Prior to the meeting Governor Wolf released a statement in support of the workgroup and the justice reinvestment process. That statement is included below, along with an article covering the meeting.
CSG Justice Center staff have begun developing the second working group presentation, which will continue to focus on counties impacts and outcomes, sentencing complexity and variation, and prison and parole volumes.
Pennsylvania had the fourth highest incarceration rate increase in the nation from 2004 to 2014, and currently has the highest incarceration rate in the Northeast region. In 2014, nearly half of new court commitments to prison were for property or drug offenses.Corrections spending has increased 55 percent over the last decade and is currently over $2.3 billion. Pennsylvania has the highest parole supervision rate in the country, and state parole numbers continue to rise. Seventy-five percent of the criminal justice population is monitored at the local level through a combination of jail, probation, county parole and intermediate punishment options. The county supervised population has increased by 13 percent since 2010.
1. Begin development of the second presentation to the Pennsylvania Justice Reinvestment Working Group on May 18, 2016.
2. Continue engagement of stakeholders and working group members in order to hone the project’s scope of work.
3. Two site visits are planned for mid-April. The first is a meeting of victims and their advocates convened by staff from the Office of Victim Advocate, Pew National Crime Victim Advocate, and CSG Justice Center Senior Policy Advisor on Victims. CSG Justice Center staff will also present and attend the annual conference of Pennsylvania’s Criminal Justice Advisory Boards (CJAB), which will be attended by local criminal justice planning and problem solving groups.
o Meeting with Legislative Director (ACLU) to discuss the role of advocacy groups in the justice reinvestment project.
o Meeting with Chair (Justice Reinvestment Working Group) / Chair (Pennsylvania Commission of Crime and Delinquency) to discuss the next day’s working group meeting and presentation.
o Meeting with 100th District Senator to introduce the justice reinvestment project.
o Meeting with Deputy Director (County Commissioners Association of Pennsylvania) to discuss the role of counties in the justice reinvestment project.
o Meeting with Dauphin County District Attorney and Chief (Legislation and Policy Unit Philadelphia District Attorney's Office) to discuss the scope of work of the justice reinvestment project.
o Meeting with Director of Planning, Research, and Statistics (Department of Corrections) to discuss data retrieval from DOC.
o Presented to the first meeting of the Pennsylvania Justice Reinvestment Working Group.
o Meeting with Director, Office of Criminal Justice System Improvements (PCCD) and Descriptive Statistician & Evaluation Consultant (Office of Criminal Justice System Improvements, PCCD) to discuss County Intermediate Punishment (CIP) data.
o Meeting with Secretary, Policy and Planning (Office of the Governor) to introduce the justice reinvestment project.
3/2) Call with Chief Probation Officer (Bucks County) to discuss the involvement of county probation in the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/3) Call with Secretary (Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs) to discuss the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/4) Call with Executive Director (Pennsylvania Chiefs of Police Association) to discuss the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/4) Call with President Judge of Philadelphia County to discuss the justice reinvestment project.• (3/11) Call with 151st District Representative to introduce the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/22) Call with Editor (The Prison Journal) / Professor Emerita (Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Indiana University of Pennsylvania) to discuss the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/23) Call with Legislative Director (Philadelphia ACLU) to discuss the role of advocacy groups in the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/29) Call with Dauphin County District Attorney and Chief (Legislation and Policy Unit Philadelphia District Attorney's Office) to discuss the analyzing the effectiveness of prison programming.
• (3/30) Call with Co-Executive Director (Berks Connections/Pretrial Services) to introduce the justice reinvestment project.
• (3/31) Call with Vice President (Families Against Mandatory Minimums) to discuss potential front-end reforms in the justice reinvestment project.
In March, Phase I work in Pennsylvania by CSG Justice Center research staff began with finalizing the launch presentation for delivery to the Working Group on March 9th. A draft of the presentation was sent to key stakeholders and providers of the data for review on and we received significant feedback from the Sentencing Commission, DOC, and the Board of Probation and Parole during the first week of March. The presentation was then completed and delivered to the Working Group with a focus on three main areas of initial analysis: county impacts and outcomes; sentencing complexity and variation; and prison and parole volumes.
After the presentation the CSG Justice Center staff started planning for the next presentation in May by creating an outline of potential analysis. Research staff has just begun analysis of sentencing data by examining trends in dispositions over the last 10 years and exploring geographic variations in sentencing patterns. CSG Justice Center research staff also just received a preliminary sample data set of court filing data that will improve understanding of what is happening at the front end of the system that will continue through April.
• (3/1) Edited and finalized the first presentation to the working group based on feedback from Pennsylvania stakeholders and the CSG Justice Center staff. New slides created to introduce local probation caseloads, county probation funding and the jail population.
• (3/14) Worked on a new template for justice reinvestment presentations continued and the initial shell of the presentation for Pennsylvania in May set up.
• (3/21) Continued development of the next presentation outline and research agenda. Began initial analysis of Sentencing Commission data, including creation of a new 10-year analysis file, basic frequencies and trends, and improving comprehension of the file structure.
• (3/29) Initial exploration of two AOPC sets of 12 related files of court filing data from two counties in 2014
(3/9) Pennsylvania Governor's Statement on First Meeting of Justice Reinvestment Initiative Working Group (http://www.cor.pa.gov/initiatives/Pages/Justice-Reinvestment.aspx#.V1tk…)
Please respond to the Performance Metrics below. The Performance Metrics questions are based on the TTA Type indicated in the General Information section of the TTA.
Please submit a signed letter of support from your agency’s executive or other senior staff member. The letter can be emailed to or uploaded with this request. The letter should be submitted on official letterhead and include the following information:
- General information regarding the request for TTA services, i.e., the who, what, where, when, and why.
- The organizational and/or community needs specific to the request for TTA services.
- The benefits or anticipated outcomes from the receipt of TTA services.
By submitting this application to BJA NTTAC, I understand that upon approval of this application for TTA, the requestor agrees to keep BJA NTTAC informed of any circumstances that may impact the delivery of the TTA, including changes in the date of the event, event cancellation, or difficulties communicating with the assigned TTA provider.
Please call [site:phone] if you need further assistance completing this application.