People who work in our criminal justice system or who have experienced the system in other ways understand the prison overcrowding crisis and agree to a remarkable degree on the solutions. TCJC conducted a survey in May, 2006, of judges, DAs, probation and parole officials, family members of the incarcerated, and other opinion leaders in an effort to better inform the Sunset review of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The Sunset process is a top-to-bottom agency review that TDCJ underwent throughout 2006. We received thousands of responses, and distributed the results widely among our supporters and to key state policy-makers.
Major findings included: Only 9% of respondents felt that the primary purpose of TDCJ should be punishment of a person through confinement, while 91% of respondents felt the primary purpose should be re-integrating offenders into society through rehabilitation or deterrence/recidivism-reduction. Also, 94% of survey respondents felt that probation, parole, and treatment programs should be allocated more criminal justice budget dollars than they were getting. These results generated important discussions among media, legislators, and opinion leaders, many of whom are prone to believe the public only wants more and more punitive laws.
Many suggestions from our surveyed opinion leaders became the basis for legislation during the 80th Texas legislative session – and perhaps more importantly became the basis for a bipartisan consensus that the State needed to reinvest funds in alternatives to incarceration, re-entry programs, and drug and alcohol treatment. While we’re disappointed that legislators and the Governor also chose to approve numerous new bills that increase prison sentences and approved bond money to build three new prisons, a raft of other bills passed and signed by the Governor will likely make prison building unnecessary, according to the State's leading experts.
This year TCJC was honored to work with allies from every part of the political spectrum to achieve landmark reforms in 2007 that will make Texans more safe and our criminal justice system more fair and efficient. House Corrections Chairman Jerry Madden and Senate Criminal Justice Chairman John Whitmire successfully spearheaded a remarkable, bipartisan collaboration in which TCJC was proud to be invited to participate, beginning with the Sunset Commission review of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice last year. These two state leaders deserve huge credit and thanks for their leadership and hard work.
Given this unique opportunity, TCJC worked with probation and parole officers and directors, family members of prisoners, attorneys, state and local judges, members of law enforcement, alcohol and drug treatment providers, formerly incarcerated individuals, researchers and policy analysts, advocates for victims or those incarcerated, faith-based advocates, Republican and Democratic policy-makers and their staffs, ideological conservatives who support smaller government, and an array of institutional interests whose needs must be balanced in the process. When the Texas Youth Commission scandals made juvenile justice legislation an instant top legislative priority, TCJC was similarly humbled by the invitation from state leaders to help craft workable, bipartisan legislation.