News
Announcement: Apply to Attend Strategic Management and the Use of Evidence Based Practice for Paroling Authorities, May 19-20 at APAI in Orlando, FL
The National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) a partnership of the Center for Effective Public Policy (CEPP), the Association of Paroling Authorities International (APAI), and the Urban Institute, supported by a grant from the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA), is pleased to announce a two day workshop entitled Strategic Management and the Use of Evidence Based Practice for Paroling Authorities to be conducted Saturday, May 19- Sunday, May 20, 2012 in Orlando, Florida in conjunction with the APAI Annual Training conference. (Although funding for this workshop is provided in the grant supporting the National Parole Resource Center, recent procedural changes at the Department of Justice require that every meeting sponsored under their funding be individually approved. A request for approval of this event—proposed in the original grant application—was submitted in November 2011, and all financial guidelines regarding how funds may be utilized are being observed. Approval is anticipated, however, funds may not be obligated—e.g., airline tickets purchased, etc.—until specific approval has been received. NPRC will keep applicants for this event fully informed as to the status of plans, and will notify them specifically before any travel costs may be incurred.)
To learn more about this event, click here.
Applications are due on February 17, 2012 and potential applicants will be notified about their selection by March 16, 2012.
To apply, click here.
Announcement: The Center for Effective Public Policy and The Carey Group Joint Announcement
The Center for Effective Public Policy (the Center) and The Carey Group (TCG) are pleased to announce the following exciting news on behalf of both of our organizations.
Effective January 1, 2012, Madeline (Mimi) Carter, Principal at the Center for Effective Public Policy, will also join The Carey Group as a managing partner. Ms. Carter will continue to serve as one of the three Principals at the Center who—as a team—lead and direct the Center. She will also maintain her administrative role with the Center, while continuing to direct and serve on Center-led project teams. She will remain Initiative Director of the Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems, an initiative funded by the National Institute of Corrections to test the application of evidence-based practices to local criminal justice decisions to achieve measureable reductions in pretrial misconduct and post-conviction recidivism risk. In addition, she will continue to provide her expertise to other projects on parole, gender responsiveness, justice reinvestment, and sex offender management.
The Carey Group is pleased to add Ms. Carter’s talent, knowledge, skills, and experience to its staff. Her experience in evidence-based practices is a particular complement to TCG’s work, but she brings a long and impressive resume in all aspects of project management, criminal justice, and policy work. She has over thirty years of practical and professional experience to the field of offender management, having managed numerous national, state and local projects on a variety of offender-management related topics, including developing policy and guidelines to respond to probation and parole violations, implementing evidence-based practices, advancing effective prisoner reentry strategies, and working with special populations including women offenders and sex offenders. She has authored thirty-six publications on a variety of criminal justice topics, most notably on the management of probation and parole violations, adult and juvenile sex offender management, and offender reentry. She is the editor of the Center’s Coaching Packet series that provides practitioners with practical guidance on the application of evidence-based practices to their day-to-day work. Ms. Carter also directs the Center for Sex Offender Management, and has served as director since establishing it on the behalf of the U.S. Department of Justice in 1996. She has been with the Center in an executive role since 1991
We believe that these changes, which will affect both our organizations, will strengthen each and enhance our operations and working relationship. We look forward to exploring, together and separately, the benefits this reorganization can bring, both to our organizations and to you as our funders, project partners and clients.
Announcement: On January 30, 2011, a group of panelists including:
· Harriet Heiberg, BJA National Training and TA Center (click to view presentation)
· Peggy Burke, National Parole Resource Center (click to view presentation)
· Becki Ney, National Resource Center on Justice Involved Women (click to view presentation)
· Michael Thompson, Second Chance Act, National Reentry Resource Center
delivered a workshop at the 2011 ACA Winter Training Institute entitled “Utilizing the Resource Center Model to Facilitate Correctional Planning and Program Development.” This workshop was moderated by Gary Dennis of the Bureau of Justice Assistance. To access the presentations, click the links above.
Announcement: The National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) is soliciting applications from parole boards who have experienced (or anticipate that they will experience) a significant change in their membership to test a “continuity curriculum” currently under development by the NPRC. This curriculum will be designed to respond to the challenges facing paroling authorities who are working to assimilate new members, and to provide those members with the adequate information and resources necessary to do their jobs most effectively. Under this initiative and utilizing the curriculum that is developed, the NPRC will provide specialized assistance to up to three paroling authorities who are experiencing significant turnover in membership and demonstrate a need for and an ability to benefit from this assistance. For more information and/or to access the application form, click here.
Announcement: The NPRC is now able, as resources allow, to provide a limited amount of short-term technical assistance to paroling authorities who are interested in enhancing their work and bringing their policies into alignment with evidence based practices. Specifically, requests will be considered to the extent that they focus on promoting at least one of the following “practice targets” for paroling authorities:
1. Use good, empirically-based, actuarial tools to assess risks and criminogenic needs of offenders;
2. Develop and use clear, evidence-based, policy-driven decisionmaking tools and practices that reflect the full range of a paroling authority’s concerns (e.g., punishment, victim issues, community safety, etc.);
3. Develop meaningful partnerships with institutional corrections and community supervision (and others) to encourage:
a. a seamless transition process;
b. the availability of sound, evidence-based programs;
4. Use their influence and leverage to target institutional and community resources to mid and high risk offenders to address their criminogenic needs;
5. Consider for release at the earliest stage possible—in light of statutes and other sentencing interests—offenders assessed as low risk;
6. Use the parole interview/hearing/review process as an opportunity to—among other goals--enhance offender motivation to change;
7. Fashion condition setting policy to minimize requirements on low-risk offenders, and target conditions to criminogenic needs of medium and high risk offenders;
8. Develop policy-driven, graduated responses to parole violations that incorporate considerations of risk, criminogenic need and severity, assure even-handed treatment of violators, and utilize resources wisely ;
9. Develop and strengthen case-level decisionmaking skills/capacities in these areas, and
10. Develop and strengthen agency level policy making, strategic management and performance measurement skills/capacities.
Interested applicants should complete and submit the Technical Assistance Application. Applications may be submitted electronically via email to Peggy Burke, NPRC Project Director, at pburke@cepp.com. The NPRC welcomes inquiries about this technical assistance program, and encourages individuals who are interested in submitting applications to be in touch with NPRC to discuss their technical assistance needs and how these needs might be translated into a formal application. Please contact Peggy Burke with questions via email or by phone at 301-589-9383.
For Immediate Release: The Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems Initiative Selects Seven Jurisdictions to Participate as EBDM Sites
Seven jurisdictions have been selected to serve as EBDM Sites as part of Phase II of the Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems Initiative. They are:
- Mesa County, Colorado
- Grant County, Indiana
- Ramsey County, Minnesota
- Yamhill County, Oregon
- City of Charlottesville/County of Albemarle, Virginia
- Eau Claire County, Wisconsin
- Milwaukee County, Wisconsin
For more information on the initiative, as well as the exciting activities underway as part of Phase II of this initiative, visit http://ebdmoneless.org.
For Immediate Release: The National Parole Resource Center (NPRC) Invites Four Paroling Authorities and their Collaborative Partners to To Participate as NPRC "Learning Sites"
Based on the results of a competitive application process—for which 17 states submitted applications--The National Parole Resource Center has invited 4 state paroling authorities, and their collaborative partners, to participate with the Center as Learning Sites. They are:
- The Connecticut Board of Pardons and Paroles,
- The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles,
- The Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole, and
- The South Dakota Board of Pardons and Paroles.
NPRC staff are already in conversations with the sites, planning the kick-off of onsite technical assistance and strategic planning work with these states which will continue through the first half of 2011. In all four states, the project will work with paroling authorities to move toward “10 Practice Targets for Effective Parole Decision Making.” In addition, in Pennsylvania and South Dakota, project resources include training and technical assistance to implement “13 Strategies for Successful Parole Supervision.” The NPRC Learning Sites initiatives is designed to support participating sites as they strengthen their decision making and supervision practices, and to generate lessons and insights that will be shared widely with other jurisdictions through the NPRC web site and continuing training and technical assistance. Short-term, targeted technical assistance is also available from the NPRC.
For Immediate Release: The Public Welfare Foundation funds “Strategic Planning Capacity Building for Prisoner Reentry Under the Second Chance Act”
The Public Welfare Foundation has granted the Center for Effective Public Policy (the Center) and its partner, Northpointe Institute for Public Management (Northpointe), funding to support “Strategic Planning Capacity Building for Prisoner Reentry Under the Second Chance Act.” The federal Second Chance Act’s (SCA) demonstration grants provide funding for implementation activities such as direct services, grant administration, and staff training to support reentry efforts. Additionally, SCA requires that states that request funding for demonstration projects develop and implement state-level comprehensive and strategic plans in order to reduce recidivism by as much as 50% over five years. This grant award will allow the Center and Northpointe to support the development of these strategic plans and provide assistance directly to the states that will support the essential planning that will allow these systems to improve their performance, reduce crime, and reduce the costly cycle of offender failure. This grant award will increase the capacity of states to create better strategic plans that will lead to more effective implementation efforts, will ultimately increase the likelihood that each jurisdiction will be able to impact the success rates of people returning home. This will be critical to achieving the significant reductions in recidivism upon which their federal grant funding is based. The grant application received support from the National Institute of Corrections, the Bureau of Justice assistance, the National Reentry Resource Center, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and the Justice Policy Center of the Urban Institute.
Learn More About: A Framework for Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems
In June 2008, the National Institute of Corrections (NIC) awarded the Center, in partnership with the Pretrial Justice Institute, the Justice Management Institute, and The Carey Group, a cooperative agreement to address "Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems." The goal of the initiative is to build a system wide framework (arrest through final disposition and discharge) that will result in more collaborative, evidence-based decision making and practices in local criminal justice systems. The initiative seeks to equip criminal justice policymakers in local communities with the information, processes, and tools that will result in measurable reductions of pretrial misconduct and post-conviction reoffending. The first phase of this effort has resulted in the development of A Framework for Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems (“the Framework”). The Framework identifies the key structural elements of a system informed by evidence-based practice.
Click here to download A Framework for Evidence-Based Decision Making in Local Criminal Justice Systems ("the Framework")
Now Available: Coaching Packets to Assist in the Identification of Strengths and Gaps in Offender Reentry Practices
The Center, in conjunction with project partners 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 the 2007 Presidential Prisoner Reentry Initiative (PRI). As part of the PRI TTA Program, eleven “coaching packets” were developed. Each of these one of a kind documents 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 topical 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.