PA Corrections Department to Receive Recognition

HARRISBURG, Pa., June 4, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, along with other non-profit community groups and law enforcement agencies from across the U.S., will be recognized in Boston in June as a runner-up winner for the Pioneer Institute's "Better Government Competition" awards dinner.

"This award adds to the national recognition our agency already has received for implementing performance-based contracts with privately operated halfway house providers in order to incentivize recidivism reduction," Acting Corrections Secretary John Wetzel said.

For this year's competition, which focused on innovative ways to address over-incarceration, recidivism, crime lab processes and other areas of America's troubled criminal justice system, 150 entries were submitted covering the topic of "Improving Public Safety and Controlling Costs in America's Criminal Justice System."

The DOC's submission -- Paying for Success in Community Corrections, by Dr. Kiminori Nakamura and Dr. Bret Bucklen – discussed an original approach to community corrections that directly builds the performance goal of recidivism reduction into contracts with privately operated halfway houses, providing financial incentives for recidivism reduction and penalties for increases in recidivism. The use of contractual recidivism performance targets helps to reduce recidivism by making community corrections facilities more accountable for public safety outcomes.

Pennsylvania's community corrections performance-based contracting idea was developed by the Department of Corrections' Office of Planning, Research and Statistics, in conjunction with Dr. Kiminori Nakamura from the University of Maryland.  Dr. Nakamura was brought to the department in 2011 under grant funds from the U.S. Department of Justice, as an "embedded criminologist."  In this role, he serves as a research/evaluation partner and a general scientific advisor to the department.  He has assisted in the development of many research-based initiatives throughout the department, including the development of the community corrections performance-based contracting model.  The Pioneer Institute award highlights not only the benefit of the performance-based contracting model, but also the benefit of this ongoing partnership model with Dr. Nakumara.

"During the first period of these new contracts, 11 community contract facilities (CCFs) significantly reduced their recidivism rate and thus qualified to receive a 1 percent pay increase," Wetzel said.  "Overall, for the entire CCF system, the recidivism rate went down by 16.4 percent during this first period.  It is estimated that this prevented approximately 58 potential victims of crime in Pennsylvania during this short first period.  These are very encouraging and positive results." 

Wetzel said that the department is eagerly awaiting the results from the second period of the contracts, which should become available in July 2016.

Pioneer Institute's Better Government Competition, founded in 1991, is an annual citizens' ideas contest that rewards some of the nation's most innovative public policy proposals. As Pioneer's signature event, the Better Government Competition Awards Dinner attracts hundreds of leaders in the business, non-profit, government and media communities.

Pioneer Institute is an independent, non-partisan, privately funded research organization that seeks to improve the quality of life in Massachusetts through civic discourse and intellectually rigorous, data-driven public policy solutions based on free market principles, individual liberty and responsibility, and the ideal of effective, limited and accountable government.

MEDIA CONTACT:   Susan McNaughton (717) 728-4025
Susan Bensinger (717) 728-4026

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Corrections