One of the most confounding recent trends in the criminal justice system is the disproportional increase in incarceration in rural areas. The main motivating factors of this trend have yet to be uncovered in their totality. This page seeks to explore the potential driving forces behind this pattern, along with highlighting the rural counties which are fighting this concerning, recent trend.
“As one jail administrator said, the reality in the Kentucky coalfields today is that “state prisoners keep the lights on,” at least when it comes to county jails. The money that the state pays out for locking up state prisoners in local jails has supplanted the role of coal as a revenue source for county budgets.“
Vera Institute
March 4, 2019
Read More‘The figures underline what many have already noted as a “rural jail crisis” of overcrowded and outdated facilities, much of it caused by the increase in mentally ill or substance-abuser populations driven by the nation’s opioid epidemic. The data also showed a sharp racial disparity in New York City, which has experienced some of the deepest and longest sustained reductions in crime, as well as jail populations.‘
The Crime Report
December 14, 2018
Read More“As Vera’s Incarceration Trends tool shows, it’s a problem that’s actually in all of our backyards—the place where the solutions also lie because it is city and county officials—such as police, prosecutors, and judges—who decide who and how to arrest, prosecute, and sentence. All people that are directly accountable to their local constituents. “
Vera Institute
December 13, 2018
Read More“While the program has historically been used to fund public infrastructure, it was not until 1996 that the USDA decided to fund a jail: the Hale County jail in Greensboro, Alabama, for $2.2 million. Since then, according to various records of the transactions, the USDA has funded over $360 million in jail construction in rural areas. “
Vera Institute
October 20, 2018
Read More"Against the high, mountainous landscapes of Colorado, communities both large and small are dealing with the burden of high and rising jail incarceration rates, and they are being presented with a choice: to build or not to build. In this context of worsening and crowded conditions, jail construction continues to move forward in Alamosa, and is being considered elsewhere. Yet the people of Pueblo have decided, twice now, that they do not want to invest their collective resources into more jail."
Vera Institute for Justice
July 31, 2018
Read More"In fact, Lackawanna County has one of the highest jail incarceration rates in Pennsylvania, higher than any county in the state besides Philadelphia, and higher than any county in New York, New Jersey, or anywhere in New England."
Vera Institute for Justice
June 2018
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