Representative Jerry Madden Among Leaders Testifying at Congressional Hearing on Justice Reinvestment

Washington, DC— Texas State Representative Jerry Madden (R-Plano), vice chair of the House Corrections Committee, was among the expert witnesses requested to speak about “justice reinvestment” before the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security last week. Madden joined several government leaders and corrections experts to testify at the May 11 congressional hearing on the Criminal Justice Reinvestment Act of 2009. The act would establish a grant program to help states and local jurisdictions reduce spending on corrections, control growth in the prison and jail populations, and increase public safety.

Madden presented the results of a comprehensive analysis of the Texas correctional system and prison population (one of the largest in the country) that helped state policymakers identify key factors that contribute to corrections growth and unsustainable spending.

“Between 1985 and 2005, the state prison population grew 300 percent,” he said. “Despite an expenditure of $2.3 billion made during 1983 to 1997 to add 108,000 prison beds; a decade later Texas prisons were overcrowded again. We knew we had to make some significant policy changes.”

In response, Madden joined with Texas Senator John Whitmire (D-Houston) to request intensive technical assistance from the Council of State Governments Justice Center, in partnership with the Public Safety Performance Project of the Pew Center on the States and the Bureau of Justice Assistance, to analyze corrections and other relevant data. The results were used to enact justice reinvestment strategies that led to savings of $443.9 million for 2008 and 2009.“Since the enactment of these policies our crime rates are down, revocations are down, and our prison population is stable,” he said.

Texas is not alone in recognizing the need to find fiscally responsible ways to address public safety and corrections policy. In the past 20 years, state spending on corrections has grown at a rate faster than nearly any other state budget item, increasing from more than $12 billion in 1988 to more than $50 billion in 2008. Despite this increased expenditure, recidivism rates remain high: a Bureau of Justice Statics report indicated that half of all studied individuals who were released from state prison were reincarcerated within three years.
“In the face of projected record state budget deficits, certain states—including my own state of Texas—have undertaken criminal justice reinvestment initiatives to save money by reducing inefficiencies in state and local criminal justice systems,” said Congressman Ted Poe (R-TX) who served as Ranking Member for the hearing.
Rep. Madden urged the Subcommittee to quickly take up the Justice Reinvestment Act to assist states to make more effective use of taxpayers’ public safety dollars. Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), John Cornyn (R-TX), and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) introduced companion legislation in the U.S. Senate, which was recently reported out of the Judiciary Committee with bipartisan support.

The Justice Reinvestment Act authorizes the U.S. Attorney General to make grants to state and local governments and tribes to help jurisdictions (1) analyze criminal justice trends to understand what is driving the growth in their local jail and prison populations, (2) develop tailored policy options to reduce corrections expenditures and increase the effectiveness of current spending and reinvestment that can make communities safer, (3) implement the proposed policies and programs, and (4) measure the impact of these changes and develop accountability measures.

For more information on justice reinvestment, visit http://www.justicereinvestment.org. A copy of Rep. Madden’s testimony can be found at http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/hear_100511.html.