Justice Reinvestment in the United States: An Empirical Assessment of the Potential Impact of Increased Correctional Programming on Recidivism

Recent efforts in justice reinvestment in the United States have echoed the importance of using evidence-based practices. Legislative initiatives support the expansion of these practices and related programming to a broader array of correctional populations and settings. But the efforts to date are likely to have limited success altering the outcomes from the use of incarceration unless more attention is paid to the principles of effective interventions and access to efficacious treatment services. The most comprehensive survey of services, conducted in 2005-2006, found that less than 10% of offenders can participate in treatment services on a given day. Two simulation models are reported in this paper that demonstrate different impacts from increasing the number and type of programs offered within correctional and community correctional settings: expanding access and participation rates in programs can yield reductions in recidivism, adding treatment matching will accelerate the recidivism reduction, and by offering risk-need-responsivity (RNR) programming the reincarceration rate can be reduced by 3-6%. This paper offers four measures that can be used to gauge performance of systems undergoing justice reinvestment initiatives. Expanding correctional programming is an important, if not essential, component of undoing the impact of mass incarceration policies.