Priorities & Public Safety: Reentry and the Rising Costs of our Corrections System
Len Engel
December 2009
This report, prepared by CJI for The Boston Foundation (TBF) as part of TBF's Understanding Boston series, examines the growth of the cost of corrections in Massachusetts in contrast to government spending for other competing sectors, identifies programs that could be adopted here, and describes specific reforms to bring costs under greater control.
Along with the rest of the country, Massachusetts is in the midst of an economic crisis that necessitates cuts to vital state services and increased taxes to limit the impact of the cuts. Because budgets for corrections departments have grown at a faster rate than just about any other department in the state, an examination of the Massachusetts corrections system is appropriate to understand whether taxpayer money is being spent effectively.
The circumstances in the corrections agencies and the state’s budget crisis compelled The Boston Foundation and the Crime and Justice Institute, a division of Community Resources for Justice, to examine the corrections system and the recent trends in policies that are affected by growing corrections spending.
The findings in this report suggest that the massive growth in corrections spending over the past 10 years has not been driven by equal growth in the corrections population or in improved public safety outcomes. The questions raised by these findings revolve around the state’s willingness to pay nearly any amount for criminal justice policies currently in place without evidence of better outcomes.
Read the full report Priorities & Public Safety: Reentry and the Rising Costs of our Corrections System
