Texas
Step 2: Identify options to generate savings and increase public safety.
In January 2007, House and Senate members, under the leadership of state Senator John Whitmire (D, Chair, Criminal Justice Committee) and state Representative Jerry Madden (R, Chair, Corrections Committee), convened a rare joint hearing to review all factors contributing to the increase in the prison population, respond to research findings by the state Sunset Commission, a legislative committee established to review the necessity of state agencies including the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ), and consider policy options which would reduce recidivism and increase public safety. In addition to the analyses that identified the factors driving the growth of the prison population, the legislature requested that the Justice Center and its expert consultant present a set of policy options that included expanding residential and in-prison substance abuse and mental health treatment capacity, enhancing the use of parole and diversion programs, and transferring two Texas Youth Commission (TYC) facilities to the TDCJ to quickly expand prison capacity.
Leaders in the House and Senate worked with the Texas Legislative Budget Board (LBB) and the Sunset Commission, to review several policy options and their estimated impact. According to these policy analyses, increasing the capacity of treatment and diversion programs would reduce prison admissions due to a reduction in revocations, while enhancing the use of parole would allow the TDCJ to operate at capacity—without a bed shortfall by 2012.4
In May 2007 the Texas Legislature enacted a package of criminal justice legislation which many policymakers consider to be the most expansive redirection in state corrections policy since the early 1990s. The new policies included an expansion of treatment and diversion programs with:
- 800 new beds in a residential program for people on probation supervision with substance abuse needs;
- 3,000 slots for outpatient substance abuse treatment for people on probation supervision;
- 1,400 new beds in intermediate sanction facilities to divert probation and parole technical violators from prison;
- 300 new beds in halfway house facilities for people under parole supervision;
- 500 new beds in a new facility for an in-prison treatment unit targeting people with DWI offenses;
- 1,500 new beds for an in-prison intensive substance abuse treatment program; and
- 1,200 slots for intensive substance abuse treatment programs in the state jail system.
- establishing a maximum limit for parole caseloads to ensure adequate supervision;5
- reducing probation terms for drug and property offenders from a maximum of 10 years to a maximum of five years to ensure that they receive treatment and supervision during the years when research studies show that they are more likely to re-offend;6
- establishing incentives for counties that create progressive sanctioning models for probation officers to respond effectively to violations of supervision;7 and
- expanding drug courts and other specialty courts to place offenders who committed minor crimes in treatment programs that will reduce their likelihood to re-offend.
The new policies enhance parole and probation policies and procedures by:
Policymakers also authorized bond funding for the construction of three new prisons—an addition of 3,990 beds. But construction for these institutions can proceed only if the new polices and programs are not implemented effectively and the LBB deems such construction necessary.8
- Council of State Governments Justice Center, Texas Justice Reinvestment Scenarios, 2007.
- Texas Legislature, House Bill 3736, “An Act Relating to Establishing Parole Officer Maximum Caseloads,” enacted 2007.
- Texas Legislature, House Bill 1678, “An Act Relating to the Operation of a System of Community Supervision,” enacted 2007. Dr. Patrick A. Langan and Dr.David J Levin, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Recidivism of Prisoners Released in 1994, NCJ193427, June 2002.
- Texas Legislature, Senate Bill 166, “An Act Relating to a Prison Diversion Progressive Sanctions Program,” enacted 2007.
- Texas Legislature, House Bill 530, “An Act Relating to the Operations and Funding of Drug Court Programs,” enacted 2007.