The Reducing Recidivism and Second Chance Act of 2007

The Reducing Recidivism and Second Chance Act of 2007
S. 1060, Introduced March 29, 2007 by Senators Biden, Specter, Brownback & Leahy
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Purpose

The Reducing Recidivism and Second Chance Act of 2007 provides competitive grants to promote innovative programs to test out a variety of methods aimed at reducing recidivism rates. Efforts would be focused on post-release housing, education and job training, substance abuse and mental health services, and mentoring programs, just to name a few.

Need for this Legislation

Over two million people are serving time in our federal and state prisons, and millions more are in local jails. Ninety-five percent (approximately 650,000 per year) of all prisoners incarcerated today will eventually be released.

These offenders are currently reentering our communities with insufficient monitoring, little or no job skills (up to 60 percent are unemployed), inadequate drug treatment (between 57 and 70 percent of inmates used drugs regularly before incarceration), insufficient housing (15-27 percent expect to go to homeless shelters upon release), lack of positive influences, a paucity of basic physical and mental health services, and deficient basic life skills. Not surprisingly, two-thirds of released state prisoners are expected to be rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within three years of release. The cost to society is enormous—the average annual cost of incarcerating a prisoner is $20,000, and the annual expenditures for incarceration increased more than six-fold between 1982 ($9 billion) and 2002 ($60 billion).

What the Bill Does

The Reducing Recidivism and Second Chance Act of 2007 authorizes $192 million annually to address these issues:

It reauthorizes and makes improvements to existing State and local government offender reentry program. The bill authorizes $50 million annually for the Department of Justice’s State and local grant program, increasing authorization levels, incorporating best practices from the reentry field, and requiring the measuring and reporting of performance outcomes

It authorizes new competitive grants for innovative programs to reduce recidivism. The bill authorizes $130 million each year in grants for State and local governments and public and private entities to develop and implement comprehensive substance abuse treatment programs, academic and vocational education programs, and housing and job counseling programs, and mentoring for offenders who are approaching release and who have been released. The bill requires grantees to establish performance goals and benchmarks and report performance outcomes to Congress.

It strengthens the Bureau of Prisons’ ability to provide reentry services to federal prisoners. The bill authorizes funds to improve federal offender reentry services and to establish an elderly non-violent offender pilot program.

It authorizes grants for research and best practices. The bill authorizes additional funds for research on innovative drug treatment methods, causes of recidivism, and methods to improve education and vocational training during incarceration and for the development of best practices.