PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE: …Pennsylvania’s three-year recidivism rate decreased by 7.1 percent since 2008, according to a recent report commissioned by the Justice Center of the Council of State Governments. Lawmakers in Washington want to know how Mr. Wetzel’s department achieved that.
One key was addressing problems at halfway houses that were uncovered by a 2009 University of Cincinnati study the department commissioned, Mr. Wetzel told them. It found that offenders leaving halfway houses had a 95 percent higher recidivism rate than prisoners released directly to the street.
He began to turn that around by developing a performance incentive program to reward private operators who hold down recidivism and punish those who don’t by revoking contracts. But that was just one part of Pennsylvania’s answer to recidivism… (more)
