California Corrections Spending Still High Despite Reforms

In recent years, California has made significant progress in reducing the number of people involved with the state correctional system. These declines resulted from criminal justice reforms adopted by state policymakers and the voters following a 2009 federal court order requiring California to reduce overcrowding in state prisons.

This Issue Brief examines changes in corrections spending from the 2007-08 fiscal year — when the numbers of incarcerated adults and parolees peaked — to 2015-16, which began this past July. While total corrections spending as a share of the state budget is down slightly since 2007-08, spending for adults under state jurisdiction — which comprises more than 80 percent of total corrections expenditures and includes security and operations as well as health care — remains stubbornly high.

Significantly — and permanently — reducing corrections spending will require the state to take additional steps. These could include further reforming California’s sentencing laws, particularly with an eye toward cutting the length of prison sentences. This would reduce the number of incarcerated adults, which would allow the state to close one or more prisons and could help to lower prison health care spending.

Read the Issue Brief. 

Via the California Budget & Policy Center, November 2015 report

http://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/corrections-spending-through-the-state-budget-since-2007-08-still-high-despite-recent-reforms/ 

Local Initiative Aims to Support Boys and Men of Color Exposed to Violence

Dr. Vincent Chong, Youth Alive!

Young men of color are facing a health crisis in the United States. Throughout their life, African American, Latino, and other young men of color are disproportionately affected by violent trauma, both as victims of interpersonal violence and witnesses to community or family trauma.

Exposure to trauma, particularly at an early age, can lead to lifelong mental and physical health problems, as well as health-related behaviors that promote poor outcomes. These outcomes are not limited to health, but also include involvement in the criminal justice system, difficulty with employment, and risk of repeat violent injury.Research has also shown a direct link between violence and achievement in school. For example, students who feel safe at school (87%) are also much more likely to consider attending college compared to those who do not feel safe (69%).

As a response to this health crisis, Youth ALIVE! is working with a network of community partners, health care providers, and young men of color to develop best practices aimed at interrupting this association between traumatic experiences and poor outcomes. After traumatic experiences, individuals may exhibit symptoms of trauma that include difficulty sleeping, restlessness, hyperarousal, difficulty with concentration, and numbing of emotions.

We are currently testing a screening tool that could be broadly used to identify young men who might need help coping with symptoms of trauma. We are also evaluating brief interventions designed to disrupt trauma-based symptoms in the moment, such as self-hand massage, breathing and tensing exercises, and having a stress-reduction safety plan. This work is ongoing for us and we hope to expand its reach in the coming years by testing it in hospitals, clinics, and community settings. It will take many partners and system-level changes to reduce the impact of trauma on these young men so that they are better able to to engage in healthy habits and achieve improved outcomes.

This work is ongoing for us and we hope to expand its reach in the coming years by testing it in hospitals, clinics, and community settings. For more information about Youth ALIVE!, please visit our website at www.youthalive.org.

© 2014 / California Pan-Ethnic Health Network / info@cpehn.org
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