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Evidence-Based Decision Making Framework

In June 2008, the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) launched the “Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems” initiative. While first developed for local-level implementation, the initiative has since been expanded and adapted to state-level decision making, and is now known as the “Evidence-Based Decision Making in State and Local Criminal Justice Systems” initiative. The goal of the initiative is to build a systemwide framework (arrest through final disposition and discharge) that will result in more collaborative, evidence-based decision making and practices in local criminal justice systems

This document “A Framework for Evidence-Based Decision Making in State and Local Criminal Justice Systems” defines the core principles and action strategies that criminal justice policymakers may employ to reduce the harm to communities caused by crime.

Dosage Probation: Rethinking The Structure Of Probation Sentences

This monograph provides a policy and practice framework upon which a new model of supervision—“dosage probation”—can be constructed. It offers a review of evidence-based approaches to reducing recidivism in our communities, the most recent research on dosage, and its applicability to sentencing and community supervision practices. It describes the model’s promise for increasing community safety through recidivism reduction, as well as achieving fiscal savings by reducing periods of supervision. Finally, the monograph offers a summary of the work of Milwaukee County’s criminal justice stakeholders as they design and conduct the nation’s first dosage probation experiment.

Setting Parole Conditions To Achieve Public Safety

This Action Guide is designed to assist parole boards improve and strengthen their practice with respect to setting conditions for parole release and supervision. It is one in a series of Action Guides developed by the National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) and builds upon the NPRC’s Self-Assessment Toolkit for Paroling Authorities,” an online guide that identifies ten practice targets paroling authorities should consider implementing to assist them in achieving their public safety and risk reduction goals.
Specifically, this Action Guide on Setting Parole Conditions to Achieve Public Safety is intended to assist parole board chairs, members, and staff to:

Use the information and insights gained as a result of using the NPRC Self- Assessment Toolkit for Paroling Authorities;
Consider how condition-setting practices can be part of a strategy for enhancing public safety and the wise use of resources;
Develop a common understanding of the board’s current policies and practices with respect to condition setting;
Review and analyze the evidence and “best practices” with respect to setting conditions and identify the gaps and challenges they want to address; and
Consider what changes the board would like to make and how to best plan and implement those changes.

Using the Parole Interview to Encourage Offender Motivation to Change

This Action Guide, Using the Parole Interview to Encourage Offender Motivation to Change, is designed to provide information and tools to help paroling authorities improve and strengthen their practice with respect to using the parole interview to encourage an offender’s motivation to change. It is one of a set of Action Guides developed (and under development) by the National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) to be used in concert with the Self-Assessment Toolkit for Paroling Authorities, which is an online guide that assists parole boards in considering the full range of paroling authority practices. This Action Guide is intended to assist parole board chairs, members, and staff to:

Build upon the information and insights gained as a result of using the NPRC Self- Assessment Toolkit for Paroling Authorities;
Understand the opportunity presented by the parole interview as an occasion to encourage an offender’s motivation to change;
Share information about the purposes board members have traditionally sought through their hearing practices and to consider whether using the parole interview to encourage motivation to change has been, or could in the future, be, a legitimate purpose;
Review and analyze the evidence regarding the importance of intrinsic motivation as a factor that encourages behavior change and risk reduction; and the techniques that have been demonstrated through research to enhance such motivation;
Consider what steps the Board may elect to take in order to learn and implement these techniques in the context of their parole hearings; and
How to best plan and implement the changes.

Offender Reentry Coaching Packet Series

The Center for Effective Public Policy (the Center) and its partners, The Urban Institute and The Carey Group, were selected by the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to serve as the training and technical assistance providers to Presidential Prisoner Reentry Initiative (PRI) grantees. As part of the PRI TTA Program, eleven “Coaching Packets” were developed. These Coaching Packets offer practical value beyond the jurisdictions involved in this initiative and are now available to criminal justice professionals and their partners interested in enhancing their strategies for reducing recidivism and improving offender outcomes. Each of these Coaching Packets provides an overview of a key topic related to successful offender reentry, concrete strategies and key steps for enhancing practice in this area, and a “self assessment tool” that jurisdictions can use to evaluate their strengths and challenges in the particular topic area discussed. The packets are organized in three series. Series 1 provides a blueprint for an effective offender reentry system; Series 2 addresses key issues related to the delivery of evidence-based services to offenders; and Series 3 provides guidance and tools to ensure that reentry efforts achieve their intended outcomes.

Parole Essentials: Practical Guides For Parole Leaders

NIC commissioned the development of a series of five papers entitled Parole Essentials: Practical Guides for Parole Leaders. This series builds on the Comprehensive Framework and provides concrete guidance on implementing the principles that it outlines. The series is composed of an informative set of products focused on the unique challenges facing parole leaders; it will assist them in further honing their technical skills, clearly defining their roles and responsibilities, and supporting effective practice.

Comprehensive Assessment Protocol

Jurisdictions across the country recognize clearly that the effective management of sex offenders requires more than supervision and treatment. Indeed, the effective management of sex offenders demands the thoughtful integration of these and other management components and, perhaps as importantly, ongoing collaboration among those who are responsible for carrying out these activities. CSOM developed the Comprehensive Assessment Protocol: A Systemwide Review of Adult and Juvenile Sex Offender Management Strategies (CAP) to assist jurisdictions in the enhancement of their management approaches with this offender population. The CAP is a tool that, when used as designed, will guide its users through a deliberate and highly collaborative information-gathering and analysis process. It will identify with a high degree of specificity the strengths of a jurisdiction’s sex offender management approach and the steps that can be taken to further enhance and strengthen its system.

Local Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI) Site Summaries

Through our work on the Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI), sponsored by the U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), the Center provides technical assistance and financial support to a number of counties around the country that are currently engaged in justice reinvestment efforts. The Center is currently working with a consortium of partners to provide technical assistance as part of a two-phase effort.

Best Practices in the Use of Restraints with Pregnant Women and Girls Under Correctional Custody

The National Task Force on the Use of Restraints with Pregnant Women under Correctional Custody, initially convened by the U.S. Department of Justice in 2011, created this best practices statement to articulate a set of principles to guide agencies and jurisdictions in the development of local policy and practice. These best practices are relevant across a variety of settings including criminal justice, juvenile justice, psychiatric and forensic hospitals, law enforcement transport, and others. This document refers and applies to both women (age 18 years and older) and girls (younger than age 18) who are pregnant, laboring and delivering, or in the post-partum period.
This statement is not a proscribed policy. Rather, it should serve as a starting point for individual organizations to use in developing effective internal policies, procedures, and practices that maximize safety and minimize risk for pregnant women and girls, their fetuses/newborns, and correctional and medical staff.

Resource Package for Paroling Authorities on Sex Offenders

Effectively managing sex offenders is among the top criminal justice policy concerns nationwide, and preventing sexual victimization is a key goal for professionals at all stages of the criminal justice system, including those who are responsible for parole decisionmaking. The National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) has developed a Resource Package for Paroling Authorities on Sex Offenders to assist paroling authorities to consider their current practices with adult sex offenders and the degree to which these practices align with the NPRC’s practice targets to support risk reduction. This resource is one in a series of three documents on special populations. This document is designed to provide representatives of paroling entities with preliminary insights to consider their practices within the context of research-supported and other promising practices, and identify areas in which additional attention may help strengthen their future practices with respect to sex offenders.

Public and Stakeholder Education Toolkit

Providing guidance to releasing authorities in developing a public and stakeholder education strategy is one of the charges of NPRC. This Toolkit is based on research and experience from a range of public policy disciplines, including parole — and provides both overall guidance along with examples intended to assist individual parole Boards as they develop a public and stakeholder strategy appropriate to their own mission and role.