Community Corrections Cheaper Than Regional Jail
Counties across West Virginia are warming to community corrections, in part because it costs them between $5 to $15 per offender per day, compared to $49.25 for each day in a regional jail, legislators learned Tuesday. Article from the Charleston Gazette.
“There are significant savings to sending people to community corrections as opposed to sending them to jail,” said Norb Federspiel, director of the Division of Criminal Justice Service. “My personal opinion is, the counties have been the chief beneficiaries” of community corrections, he told a legislative interim committee.
Since the Legislature passed the Community Corrections Act in 2001, 40 counties are participating in community corrections programs, primarily through day reporting centers, Federspiel said. At any given time, between 1,200 and 1,500 nonviolent offenders are in community corrections programs, saving counties about $50,000 a day in regional jail costs. “There’s no doubt that it has saved counties money to have people sentenced to day report centers instead of jails for misdemeanor offenses,” Federspiel told the interim committee on regional jails and corrections.
While West Virginia’s program is too new to provide solid data on outcomes, he said community corrections in other states have reported recidivism rates that are 40 percent lower than for incarcerated inmates. Offenders in West Virginia community corrections must complete community service assignments, undergo counseling and participate in assigned programs based on their needs. Programs include substance abuse treatment, job training, adult basic education, anger management and life skills courses. Federspiel said drug rehabilitation is a critical factor, since a significant percentage of all nonviolent offenders have been convicted either of drug offenses, or for property crimes committed in order to buy drugs. Not everyone sentenced to community corrections is up to the challenge, he told lawmakers. “There are some who’ve said, ‘This is too tough. Put me in prison,” he said.
One of the key recommendations this summer in the report of Governor’s Commission on Prison Overcrowding is to expand capacities of community corrections programs statewide. Currently, the state spends just more than $5 million a year on community corrections, with about $1.8 million coming from the state’s half of a $10 community corrections court fee imposed on all convictions other than parking tickets. In recent years, an additional $3.5 million a year has been appropriated from general revenue funds, he said. The funds are distributed to counties as grants, with counties required to put up 10 percent to 30 percent of the amount in matching funds.
Asked why 15 counties are not participating, Federspiel said most are small, rural counties that may not have significant crime problems. In some counties, he added, some circuit judges simply oppose the concept of community corrections. “Some judges philosophically don’t believe in community corrections. They believe offenders should go to jail,” he said.
Uncategorized