News items related to fiscal policy

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A Closer Look at the Aging Prison Population: Shanthi Rajagopalan, Jul 2, 2013; The number of aging state and federal inmates is rising. Between 1981 and 2010, the number of inmates age 55 and older increased from 8,853 to 124,900.
Merging BSCC leadership roles limits opportunities for reform: Selena Teji, May 28, 2013; On May 15, 2013, Governor Brown submitted a budget trailer bill that makes concerning changes to the Board of State and Community Corrections (BSCC).
Youth rehabilitation bill clears Assembly Public Safety Committee: Lizzie Buchen, Apr 25, 2013; California’s counties are one step closer to having more resources to treat and rehabilitate youth who have committed serious or violent offenses.
Up Front: Apr 1, 2013; Senior Research Fellow, Mike Males, discusses Realignment's impact on county-by-county disparities.
Building a local foundation for state juvenile justice success: Brian Goldstein, Mar 12, 2013; California counties have increasingly served as incubators for model policy innovation. State policymakers must nurture this bottom-up reform to ensure a balanced approach that benefits our justice-involved youth and promotes public safety.
Increased higher education spending enhances public safety and deters crime: Oct 4, 2012; California's budget demonstrates a commitment to correctional spending despite continued funding cuts to other important social services. According to California Common Sense , since 1980 "...the number of incarcerated felons in state prisons has increased more than eightfold despite relatively stable crime rates." Incarcerations and related costs have been driven up in part by the unnecessary incarceration of low-risk, non-violent offenders due to the Three Strikes law and similar…
National leaders in youth justice reform: Brian Heller de Leon, Jul 19, 2012; The nation has come along way in juvenile justice reform. John Jay College in New York recently released a new report that details the various juvenile justice reform efforts undertaken by states in the last 30 years. Three major strategies for reform are identified and evaluated in terms of the long-term effectiveness of each. The three main strategies they identify are resolution , meaning limiting judicial options for out-of-home placements by closing facilities; reinvestment whereby…
Legislature, Governor Brown advance historic juvenile justice reforms: Brian Heller de Leon, Jul 5, 2012; Just days after the deadline, the Governor signed the $92 billion 2012-13 California budget into law on June 27th. The budget includes some of the most significant reforms in state juvenile justice policy since the passage of Senate Bill 81 in 2007. In his May 14th revised budget proposal, Governor Brown had retracted his plan to close the state's youth correctional facilities, Division of Juvenile Facilities (DJF), under intense and well-coordinated law enforcement and county pressure. …
Are California Counties Spending Prisoner Realignment Money Wisely?: Jun 16, 2012; Are California Counties Spending Prisoner Realignment Money Wisely? CBS SF, June 14, 2012
An uncertain future for California's Higher Education: Brian Goldstein, Jun 12, 2012; California is home to one of the finest higher education systems in the world; a catalyst for innovation, job creation, and academic excellence. This includes the California Community Colleges, California State University (CSU), and University of California (UC) systems. Higher education funds represent a long-term investment that accrues dividends beyond the classroom. On May 14, Governor Brown released his revised 2012-13 budget that outlined measures to fill an estimated $15.7 billion…
A call for shared sacrifice on juvenile corrections budget: Brian Heller de Leon, Jun 7, 2012; The Senate and Assembly Budget Subcommittees on Public Safety are being pressured to reconsider the Governor's revised cost-saving proposal for the state's youth correctional system, the Division of Juvenile Facilities (commonly referred to as DJJ). Law enforcement agencies are demanding that the Legislature reduce or eliminate the new $24,000 per ward fee structure, which was proposed by the Governor's office in the May revised budget. This amount greatly contributes to the $24.8 million in…
The winnowing of California's Judiciary: Brian Goldstein, May 31, 2012; California is home to the largest court system in the county. On any given day these courts oversee proceedings that range from very high profile criminal prosecutions to the most mundane of civil litigation. In short, California's judiciary provides a safeguard for the equitable exercise of political, economic, and civil activity across the state. Yet these same courts are under significant fiscal pressure as a result of ongoing state budget deficits. In the midst of California Governor…
Take Action: divest from youth corrections, invest in communities: May 30, 2012; There is currently pressure on the California legislature from law enforcement agencies to reduce or eliminate the Governor's proposed $24,000 per youth fee structure for the Division of Juvenile Facilities. The state is already spending 20-25 times the per capita investment on youth offenders as it is on students in our UC, Cal State, K-12, and community college systems. With an 80% recidivism rate, the Division of Juvenile Facilities should receive a failing grade yet legislators are being…
Trimming the Juvenile Justice Fat: May 30, 2012; Trimming the Juvenile Justice Fat Juvenile Justice Information Exchange, May 29, 2012
Trimming the Juvenile Justice Fat: May 30, 2012; Trimming the Juvenile Justice Fat California Progress Report, May 30, 2012
Who is deciding California's budget priorities?: Brian Heller de Leon, May 24, 2012; This week, both the Senate and Assembly budget subcommittees on pubic safety held hearings on Governor Brown's revised proposal for the state's youth correctional facilities, Division of Juvenile Facilities (DJF). Under heavy pressure from law enforcement associations, the Governor backed down from his January proposal to close the front door of the DJF and allow the youth offender population to decrease through attrition. In its place, the Governor has proposed a new annual $24,000 per ward…
The Not-So-Shared Sacrifice of Californians: May 24, 2012; The Not-So-Shared Sacrifice of Californians California Progress Report, May 24, 2012
CJCJ response to Governor Brown's May budget revise: Brian Heller de Leon, May 17, 2012; On May 14, 2012 Governor Brown released the May revision to the budget for fiscal year 2012/13. The revision retracted both his original proposal for full juvenile justice realignment and the budget triggers that were implemented last year. The revised budget includes important juvenile justice reform measures. The proposal institutes a $24,000 annual per youth fee for utilizing state facilities; representing 13% of the total cost. As overuse of state facilities by some counties has created…
A Juvenile Justice Reprieve: California's 2012 Mid-Year Budget: May 1, 2012; A Juvenile Justice Reprieve: California's 2012 Mid-Year Budget
Pew Study: strong majority of voters favor alternatives to incarceration: Brian Heller de Leon, Apr 5, 2012; A new Pew research poll released last week shows that voters across the U.S. are overwhelmingly in favor of reducing prison spending and support shifting resources to community supervision rather than incarceration, specifically for low-level offenders. The national poll also shows that voters prioritize reductions in recidivism as the primary "end goal" of corrections, even if it means offenders spend less time behind bars and more time in rehabilitative programming. Public…
Misplaced priorities: California's spending on prisons vs. higher education: Brian Heller de Leon, Mar 15, 2012; A March 1st SF Chronicle article highlighted recent comments made in Washington D.C. by retiring SF State President Robert Corrigan about California's excessive prison spending and annual cuts to higher education. He noted that, "California is spending nearly as much money on prisons ($8.7 billion, or 9.45 percent of its budget), as it does on all of higher education ($9.3 billion, or 10.1 percent of its budget)". Looking at just the UC's and CSU's, the state spends less than half ($4.6…
CJCJ's Selena Teji engages in dialogue on KQED's "Phasing Out Juvenile Justice": Dinky Manek Enty, Feb 28, 2012; Selena Teji, CJCJ's Communication Specialist, discussed "Phasing Out Juvenile Justice" on KQED's Forum with Barry Krisberg, director of the Earl Warren Institute on Law and Social Policy at UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law, and Brian Brown, managing principal analyst at the Legislative Analyst's Office. If you missed the show, go to "Phasing Out Juvenile Justice " or review the summary below. The above-mentioned experts discussed the following juvenile justice realignment…
A sound investment for California taxpayers: prison or college?: Feb 14, 2012; California has long been recognized among the nation for its investment in and the priority it has assigned to providing its citizens with affordable access to higher education. However, as a result of the race to incarcerate over the past three decades, California has considerably expanded the budget allocation for corrections while simultaneously cutting the funds spent on higher education. In comparison to other states, California has the largest population, the most students in college, and…
Wasting Juvenile Justice Tax Dollars: Feb 9, 2012; Wasting Juvenile Justice Tax Dollars California Progress Report, February 9, 2012
Momentum growing for juvenile realignment: Brian Heller de Leon, Jan 26, 2012; Consensus is growing in the Capitol that California's youth correctional facilities need to be closed, with funding and supervision responsibilities realigned to the counties. Building on Past Policy Recommendations: In 2008 the Little Hoover Commission recommended that the state's Division of Juvenile Facilities (DJF) close its doors and for California to move towards a county-based juvenile system. In early 2011, the Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) concluded , "Less than 1…