Results of Virginia's Abolition of Parole and Associated Policies
1995-2009
The Need to Look at Alternatives to Imprisonment

Virginia Imprisonment History

Virginia’s growth in the imprisonment rate per 100,000 residents was 8^th highest of all states from the end of 2000 to 2008, trailing West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Florida, Alaska, Alabama and Pennsylvania.¹

• The imprisonment rate per 100,000 residents in Virginia was nine percent higher than the national average for all states.

• In FY 2008 Virginia taxpayers spent 7.6 percent of the state’s general funds on corrections.²

• Virginia ranks 12^th nationally in population, 13^th nationally in the rate of incarceration per 100,000 residents and in FY 2008 ranked 13^th in the proportion of general funds spent on corrections. In 2008 Virginia ranked 41^st in index crimes, 42^nd in violent crimes and 40^th in property crimes per 100,000 resident population.³

• Cost of abolition of parole and associated policies. A recent article⁴ cited the annual cost of holding a prisoner in Virginia as $24,667. The rate of imprisonment increased by 67 persons per 100,000 residents from 2000 to 2008. With a resident population exceeding 7.7 million in 2009, it is estimated that annual corrections costs since 2000 have increased by at least $128 million beyond that expected given population growth in the State. On a cumulative basis it can be argued that the abolition of parole and associated policies enacted at the start of 1995 have easily resulted in increasing state corrections costs by more than one billion dollars over the past decade, beyond what would have occurred with normal population growth.

• Of special interest is what has been happening to crime rates in Virginia in recent years. Have increases in incarceration rates improved public safety and lowered crime rates? Have the citizens benefited from a major increase in the incarceration of prisoners? While the changes have received political support, for a “tough on crime” approach it may be helpful to examine what has been happening in Virginia and across the country since 2000.⁵

• Declines in crime may come from several factors including changing demographics (particularly the number of young adult males), lower drug addiction rates, effective targeted efforts by local police departments, protective defensive actions by citizens and use of community based programs.

• Lower crime rates can also reflect the results of statutory changes through sentencing reform, the use of alternatives to incarceration for less serious criminal offenses and the reduction of criminal charges from felonies to misdemeanors. Reducing imprisonment can also help stabilize local neighborhoods and actually reduce crime by allowing for wage earners and parents to remain in the community even while dealing with criminal sanctions.

• The fiscal impacts of increasing imprisonment rates can easily amount to millions of dollars of public funds and, conversely, the benefits of reducing imprisonment rates can free up funds for public education, transportation improvements and other statewide priority programs.

• Of particular concern in Virginia have been the cumulative results of the abolition of parole in 1994, the de facto elimination of discretionary parole, the criminalization of drug and juvenile offenses and minor infractions, and the disparate impact of these policies on minorities and their families. Today, there is a growing national consensus (fueled in many cases by the fact that states can simply no longer afford to pay for overincarcertion) of the need to expand valuable alternatives to incarceration to both non-violent and many violent offenders both in Virginia and in many other states. The budget implications of reducing incarceration are in the millions if not billions of dollars with what appears to be a minimal impact on crime rates.

• A recent report⁶ illustrates a major policy concern regarding Virginia’s over reliance on incarceration. One of every 89 adults was incarcerated as of January 1, 2008. This puts Virginia 13^th nationally, where the national average is 1 in 100 adults. However. in Virginia only 1 in 94 adults is under community supervision compared with the national average of 1 in 45. Combining these two statistics – a high incarceration rate and a low community supervision rate—shows that 52 percent of Virginia’s adult correctional population is behind bars. Accordingly, this is the fourth highest rate in the country. Compared to other states, Virginia is using more incarceration and less community supervision. Virginia is spending almost 20 times more per day to manage prison inmates than to supervise offenders in the community. The daily cost, in 2008, of housing a prison inmate was $66.62 per day, while the daily parole and probation cost per day was $3.39.

• Given the lack of empirical evidence of a relationship between high imprisonment rates and low crime rates (or even a suggestion that high imprisonment rates may increase the crime rate in some neighborhoods) it appears that public policy changes are needed.

• Virginia C.U.R.E. supports the proposal in the Governor’s budget to extend and expand the work of the Task Force on Alternative Methods of Punishment. This proposal should be strengthened to include a study of both non-violent and violent offenders, reforms of parole and geriatric release policies and procedures, and better management tools for post-1995 offenders to incentivize them to prepare themselves for successful reentry (e.g. increasing earned sentence credits). All these measures would lower costs of imprisonment and allow for an earlier and more successful reentry of eligible prisoners back into the community.

• The general trends noted above and the data in the Virginia C.U.R.E. tables do not reveal any major correlation between crime rates and imprisonment rates. In fact, they show greater decreases in violent crime rates in states with decreased incarceration rates.

  Additional Information
  State Imprisonment Rates 2000 and 2008
  Weighted Averages Crime Rates 2000 and 2008