NCJ Number
206426
Journal
Community Corrections Report Volume: 11 Issue: 5 Dated: July/August 2004 Pages: 55-56,63
Editor(s)
Carl Reddick
Date Published
July 2004
Length
3 pages
Annotation
This article examines the use and power of opinion polls in measuring public attitudes about crime and justice, specifically punishment and community corrections.
Abstract
In a report released in 2004 on prison overcrowding in Connecticut, select findings included: 51 percent of 601 residents opposed sending inmates out-of-State to reduce overcrowding, 53 percent opposed building more prisons, 61 percent supported reducing mandatory minimum sentences for first-time offenders, and 76 percent supported more services for parolees. In addition, when asked about the purposes of criminal justice sanctioning, select findings included: 41 percent of residents preferred rehabilitation; 52 percent believed that prisoners have too many rights; and 69 percent did not agree that rehabilitation for non-violent offenders was a waste of time. This article examines public opinions and the power of public opinion polls and its impact on community corrections. Given less-expensive, equally effective options, the public wisely wants the less restrictive and less costly alternative. In developing community corrections with public support for alternatives, the question that comes to the forefront is can community corrections improve its image and demonstrate its viability? To do this, five approaches are suggested and presented: market community corrections; develop policy briefs to provide facts and figures to the public; develop distribution networks to get the information out; take a proactive stance in order to assert the value of community corrections; and bring professional and political parties together. In conclusion, community corrections and program administrators and policy makers have their work cut-out for them to establish a political environment that not only supports community corrections and offender programming, but also demands them.