SUPPORTING STATEMENT
The National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP)
The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) is requesting clearance to conduct the National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP) through October 31, 2018. Through the NCRP, BJS collects administrative records on annual movements of offenders in four cohorts: Admitted into prison, released from prison, held in prison at yearend, and discharged from post-custody community supervision (PCCS, formerly known as parole). BJS has used NCRP since 1983 to annually report on the movements of offenders through state prison systems. These statistics are part of BJS’s core corrections statistics, as they contribute fundamentally to BJS’s mission of describing transitions and movements of offenders through the criminal justice system.
Specifically, BJS uses the NCRP data to describe changes in the composition and factors affecting the size of state prison and parole populations. These are issues that have been at the forefront of discussions of corrections policy for decades. For example, during the 1990s, BJS used the NCRP data to help to demonstrate the contribution of time served to the increase in the size of the prison population. Since 2005, as prison population growth stabilized and has started to decline, BJS has used the NCRP to help in demonstrating the factors behind this pattern, including decreases in the number of parole violators returning to prison, state-specific initiatives to cut prison populations, and a renewed emphasis by legislators and prosecutors to focus on imprisoning violent offenders. BJS hopes to expand its ability to address issues concerning the prison and parole populations by linking the NCRP data to other federal administrative datasets during the next 3 years.
Data are submitted to NCRP by state departments of corrections, which provide individual-level data for each prisoner in their system that meets the definitions provided by BJS. The data in each cohort contains a common core of variables, and each cohort other than the admissions cohort includes additional variables pertaining to the stage in corrections system process represented by the cohort. The core variables collected for all five cohorts include measures of:
The date of admission;
The type of commitment (e.g., from the court, that is, a new court commitment stemming from a felony conviction versus entry as a parole or conditional release violator, transfers, unsentenced commitments, etc.);
The offenses for which offenders have been sentenced to prison;
The lengths and types of sentence imposed;
Time served in jail prior to admission;
Demographic attributes of offenders, such as date of birth to calculate age, race, gender, and education level completed;
The entity responsible for offenders (such as the state maintaining jurisdiction over an offender); and
Identification variables, including first and last name of each inmate, and identification numbers used by the state to designate individuals (BJS requests that states provide fingerprint-based IDs, including state ID and FBI ID if possible)
In addition, the prison stock cohort includes the common core plus measures of expected (or projected) dates of release from prison. The prison release cohort also includes actual dates of release, actual time served, and method of release from prison (e.g., conditional release onto parole or unconditional release). The PCCS entry and exit datasets—which pertain only to offenders released from prison conditionally—also include data on the type of entry and discharge from PCCS (e.g., success or failure) and dates of entry and exit from community supervision.
BJS has worked to increase state coverage of NCRP data. In 2012, 47 states submitted NCRP prison admission records, 48 provided NCRP prison release records, and 45 provided yearend prison population records. A total of 49 states provided at least one type of record to BJS for NCRP. Participation decreased in 2013 to 47 states, but this was due to computer systems changes in two states which have assured BJS they will submit their 2013 data during 2015. The submitted 2012 NCRP data represent 85.0% of total state prison admissions during that year, 84.7% of all releases, and 93.1% of the state prison population on December 31, 2012. During the past 3 years, 10 states have started submitting data to NCRP after having never previously participated or after lapses in participation of at least 5 years. Additionally, 17 states were able to backfill previous years’ data that they had never before submitted. BJS has worked with the final nonreporting state, Illinois, to encourage participation in NCRP. Coordination with the Illinois Department of Correction to produce NCRP data files was written into the scope of work for the FY2014 BJS award to the state’s statistical analysis center, and BJS expects to receive its first data submission from Illinois in July, 2015.
During the past three years, BJS has implemented improvements to the NCRP. Beginning with the collection of the 2012 NCRP data after clearance from OMB, BJS expanded its definition of parole to include all forms of post-prison community supervision, and solicited entries onto post-custody community supervision (PCCS) in addition to exits from these programs. Prior to 2012, NCRP had only captured exits from parole. In 2013, 26 states submitted PCCS entry records and 29 states submitted PCCS exit records, participation on par with some of the most successful years for collection of the old parole release records. BJS’s data collection agent was able to link PCCS entry and exit records to create PCCS term records for 17 states in 2013, and intends to expand the number of states with linked PCCS records as future data are submitted.
NCRP data quality has improved over the past 3 years. Linked prison term records have been constructed for 41 states, and the accuracy of these records to capture unique individuals has been underscored by the collection of the FBI fingerprint-based identification number. Some states have also made improvements in their NCRP submissions; after 20 years of submitting all prison admissions as new court commitments, Maryland revisited their data extraction programs ahead of the 2013 data collection year and is now able to provide all types of prison admissions.
The enhancements implemented during the past three years focused on assessing the reliability of NCRP records, linking records within NCRP to better track movements from prison admission to release from PCCS programs, enhancing the scope of substantive issues that can be addressed with the NCRP, and addressing methodological and estimation issues related to characterizing prison population movements. The planned enhancements during the upcoming years will focus on improving BJS’s ability to link the NCRP data across states and to external sources of administrative data to address issues affecting reentry and recidivism. BJS also plans to investigate the ability of states with centralized probation and parole reporting offices to provide individual-level probation records through NCRP. These enhancements are discussed in Section A2, Needs and Uses, below.
A. Justification
1. Necessity of Information Collection
The size, costs, and social impacts of corrections in the United States and in particular of prison populations are ongoing national policy issues. Imprisonment, the nation’s most serious punishment for crime short of execution, is its most costly sanction. State governments spent $38.6 billion dollars on institutional corrections alone in 20121, almost 4 times (in real dollars) what they spent in 1982. During this time period, the number of inmates held under state jurisdiction grew three and a half times, from 384,133 in 1982, to 1,352,582 in 20122. While state prison populations decreased in 2010 from an all-time high of 1,365,688 in 2009, the number of inmates increased during 2013. The sizable investments by states in recent years in managing prison populations have led to renewed calls about the purposes and benefits of incarceration, and these debates have only intensified as states’ budgets have suffered in the current economic climate.
During the past few years, states have experimented with alternatives to imprisonment in an attempt to reign in the monetary and social costs associated with incarceration. California is the most salient example, delegating the responsibility for inmates convicted of nonviolent, nonserious, nonsexual crimes to the counties instead of taking custody at the state level. Counties have been given money by the State of California to involve their judicial, executive, and legislative officials in the creation of alternative forms of punishment for these crimes, including incarceration in local jails, more liberal use of split jail-community sentences, sentencing to substance abuse programs in lieu of incarceration, and more probation officers to deal with the increasing number of offenders being supervised in the community. In a recent attempt to further reduce overcrowding in the state prisons and local jails, Californians passed Proposition 47, which reduces low level drug and property offenses to the status of misdemeanors instead of felonies.
While other states have not undertaken as radical an overhaul of their corrections systems as California, there is growing accord across political viewpoints that the current state of mass imprisonment is not good for states’ budgets or society at large. The Indiana state legislature passed sentencing reforms in 2014 to enhance sentencing guidelines for violent criminals while diverting low-level offenders to county jails. In 2012, Pennsylvania relocated all of its inmates previously held in out-of-state prisons to facilities in Pennsylvania and cancelled construction of a new prison. The federal government has granted money to 27 states under the Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI) and Second Chance Act (SCA) to develop policies and programs that will reduce imprisonment and encourage successful reentry into the community by released prisoners. One of the first states to obtain a JRI grant was Texas, which expanded capacity of substance abuse and mental health treatment programs, changed policies in community corrections to decrease the number of technical violators returned to prison, and reinvested savings into community-level programs for offenders3.
In light of the diversification of correctional methods now employed by states, the NCRP is vital in its ability to track trends not only in imprisonment practices, but increasingly in the use of community corrections. NCRP already tracks PCCS entries and exits, and during the next 3 years, BJS intends to evaluate states’ ability to provide centralized records for individual-level probation records on an annual basis. This task will be undertaken through BJS’ generic clearance (#1121-0339), and will gauge whether the 36 states with centralized probation and parole reporting agencies could submit NCRP probation records. Capturing probation data in the future will allow BJS to document the changing nature of how states choose to punish offenders.
Discussions about prison policy revolve around questions such as:
What are the risk factors (criminal justice and demographic characteristics) associated with multiple stints in prison? Does time served on a sentence impact recidivism?
Who gets punished with prison sentences? Is imprisonment being reserved for the most serious offenders, those that imposed the greatest harm on society or those that pose the greatest risk of recidivism, or are less risky offenders, those that could be punished by less costly community-based sanctions, also being imprisoned? Has this changed over time?
Are the lengths of prison sentences appropriate? Do we get more safety and security for longer sentences and time served or do a few extra months in prison incur costs without generating public safety benefits through incapacitation or deterrence?
What are the collateral consequences of imprisonment on society? What groups are disproportionately impacted, and if so, how much of that stems from sentencing and release practices?
What are the socioeconomic long-term effects of imprisonment on released inmates and their households?
What are the costs and benefits of shifting from imprisonment to community corrections programs for nonviolent offenders? Will states with similar sentencing statutes and practices achieve similar results if the same policy is applied to each?
BJS statistics about changes in the size and composition of the prison population, changes in flows—admissions and releases—in length of stay, about returns to prison (parole recidivism) are central to understanding how state courts’ and parole supervising agencies’ decisions about who to send to prison reflect changes in practices. While it may be beyond BJS’s mission to address some of the evaluative issues that charge the debate about the scope and purpose of prison policy, BJS’s descriptive accounts of changes in the prison population set the terms of the debate. BJS uses the NCRP, in combination with other BJS corrections statistics, to address these matters. The distinctiveness of the NCRP (individual-level administrative records), however, makes it central to BJS in accomplishing its mission of describing changes in the corrections system.
In 2012, BJS released a topical report on admissions and releases from 1978-2012, decomposing the flow in and out of state and federal prisons by offense type, sex, age, and race using the NCRP data4. It documented the increased use of parole violations during the late 1990s and early 2000s to admit prisoners, followed by an uptick in new court commitments after 2006. Data from NCRP showed an increase in the percentage of offenders admitted to state prison for violent offenses between 1991 (45%) and 2011 (54%), suggesting that prison space has been increasingly reserved for offenders who generated the most harm to society.
BJS has used NCRP to document the radical changes in the California state prison population after the implementation of AB 109, Public Safety Realignment (PSR), on October 1, 2011. Under this law, individuals convicted of nonviolent, nonsexual, or nonserious offenses are sentenced to serve time in county jails, as opposed to state prison facilities. Prior to PSR, the state was responsible for inmates released on parole; after realignment, the jurisdiction belonged to the counties, and only violent offenders could be revoked to prison. In 2011, 62% of all admissions to California prisons were through parole violations, but in 2012, this proportion dropped to 23%, and the overall number of admissions decreased 65% from 96,700 in 2011 to 34,300 in 2012.
The NCRP data form the backbone of BJS’s recidivism research. Over the past 10 years, BJS has invested in a partnership with the International Justice and Public Safety Network (Nlets) to develop a secure automated system to retrieve large sets of criminal records using the FBI Interstate Identification Index (III). Through a data sharing agreement with the FBI and Nlets, BJS is allowed to access arrest and prosecution records for research purposes, and used the NCRP records for a sample of inmates released from prisons in 30 states to follow their criminal behavior over the next 5 years. BJS developed software to parse key data elements from the arrest and prosecution records in each state, collected these data into a uniform structure, and standardized the offense and court disposition information to make it useful for cross-jurisdiction research. It is BJS’s intention to repeat this study in the coming years with multiple NCRP release cohorts. BJS has also used the NCRP and arrest and prosecution records to check data quality on each dataset: the demographic data in NCRP was a 99% match to that in the criminal history data for date of birth, and 100% for sex and race, and criminal history records showed 93% agreement with the NCRP details on the most recent imprisonment event. In addition, the information on revocations and time served from the NCRP term records is used to improve data capture on criminal history records, since some states are less diligent in recording admission to prison on the records they report to Nlets.
In the 2012 OMB clearance, BJS asked and received permission to obtain inmates’ FBI identification number, the biometric identifier unique at the national level. This allows BJS to query Nlets and obtain exact matches of criminal history records for individuals regardless of the number of states in which they have offended. Prior to conducting the recidivism study on released inmates in 30 states, BJS was forced to return to some state DOCs to request unique identifiers (SSN, a unique state biometric identifier, or FBI number), since these are the only variables that can be queried in the Nlets system. Prior to BJS’s request for the FBI identification number in NCRP, 2-3 states were already supplying this, since they had adopted it as their state ID number. In 2013, 32 states were able to provide FBI numbers for their prison release records, and when combined with the unique state biometric identifier, 41 could give either or both. This will drastically reduce the amount of burden placed on state DOCs in the next recidivism study. Inclusion of the FBI number also makes possible the identification of inmates who serve separate prison terms in different states within the NCRP collection itself, instead of having to query Nlets.
BJS has used the NCRP to document PCCS recidivism. While this measure does not encompass all types of mal-behavior following criminal justice system contact, it is an important measure for state prisons as it generates expectations about future prison populations stemming from those released in a current period. The construction of prison and PCCS term records has also improved NCRP data quality by examining the timing and logic of recidivists’ imprisonment history. While we can currently only link prison and PCCS terms in 17 states, this effort represents BJS’ attention to key issues in the policy debate about imprisonment and BJS efforts to use low-cost methods to improve the scope of coverage of its statistics.
BJS routinely uses NCRP data to generate and track changes in sex by race/ethnicity by age distributions of state prison populations and uses these to identify groups that may be disproportionately affected by prison. Some of the most common questions asked of BJS by the press and public deal with the racial disparity in imprisonment for males and females. Among women, the ratio of the non-Hispanic black to non-Hispanic white imprisonment rates (number of prisoners per 100,000 residents) remained stable between 2010 and 2013 (3 to 1) after a decline from 6 to 1 in 2000, mostly due to decreases in the number of black women and increases in white women in prison. In 2013, there were more than twice the number of white females in prison than black females. Among males, the ratio of non-Hispanic black to non-Hispanic white imprisonment rates was 6 to 1 in 2013, down from almost 8 to 1 in 2000. The disparity was highest in 2013 for 18-19 year old prisoners of both sexes, with black males almost 10 times more likely to be imprisoned than whites, and black females almost 5 times more likely than white females. While NPS provides an aggregate count of prisoners by race and sex, NCRP individual-level data are required to give details of the cross between age, race, and sex.
The aging of the state prison population has also been documented using NCRP. Between 1992 and 2012, the number of state prison inmates over the age of 55 grew from 30,700 to 124,100 inmates, a 304% increase. The changing age structure in U.S. state prison population has implications for the future management and care of inmates, including increased costs associated with healthcare for older inmates.5 NCRP data showed that several factors contributed to the aging of state prisoners over this time period, including the aging of the general population (albeit at a slower rate), changes in the racial/ethnic and sex distributions of the prison population, and most importantly, an increased number of persons age 55 or older admitted, while admissions of inmates age 24 or younger declined. In addition, a disproportionate percentage of older state prison inmates are serving sentences for violent crimes, which typically incur longer sentences.
While BJS’s descriptions of changes in the prison population are central to framing the issues for the policy debates, as described more fully in Section 2 below, the NCRP data have been central in analysts’ efforts to understand both the why behind changes and the impacts of changes.
To describe and explain changes in the size and composition of states’ prison populations, and the transition between incarceration, community corrections, and release into the general community, detailed individual-level administrative data are needed to augment the aggregate counts obtained in other BJS collections. The NCRP is the only national database that can inform these issues in depth. Changes in the age structure, racial/ethnic composition, or sentenced offense profile of prison admissions, prison releases, prison stock population, and the parole (that is, post-custody supervision) population can be described over time by NCRP in relation to other demographic and criminal characteristics that are impossible in aggregate counts of these populations. The NCRP data can be linked to external community data to better understand the re-entry of inmates and parolees through geographic variables collected. Since variations exist between and within states in the laws, implementation of laws, sentencing statutes, and community characteristics, data must be collected on the state level but also contain appropriate indicators for meaningful units of sub-state aggregation, such as the county of sentencing. Finally, to aggregate the state level data up to the national level or to produce national level estimates of important quantities, the data must be arrayed in a common format, in which the variables reliably measure core concepts across states.
The Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Street Act of 1968 (see Appendix A), as amended (42 U.S.C. 3732) authorizes the Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) to compile data on state and federal admissions to prison, releases from prison and entries and discharges from community supervision (parole). Under Title 42 of the United States Code, Section 3789, BJS collects NCRP data for statistical purposes only, does not release data pertaining to specific individuals in the NCRP, and has in place procedures to guard against disclosure of personally identifiable information. NCRP data are maintained under the security provisions outlined in U.S. Department of Justice regulation 28 CFR §22.23, which can be reviewed at: http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/bjsmpc.pdf.
2. Needs and Uses
Since 2009, the National Academies has released two important reports pertaining to BJS data in general, and NCRP in particular. As discussed in the last OMB clearance, the Committee on National Statistics (CNSTAT) of the National Academies reviewed BJS programs and data collections in 2009.6 The CNSTAT report identified several gaps in coverage of BJS corrections statistics, including: (a) expand coverage to include prisoner reentry and recidivism issues; (b) emphasize the flows and transitions of inmates in the corrections system; and (c) develop and enhance longitudinal datasets so that the data cover more steps in the criminal justice system instead of cross-sectional surveys on discrete parts of the system. During the past three years, BJS has used NCRP to address these gaps in the following ways:
Expand coverage to include prisoner reentry and recidivism issues
As stated in section A1, BJS uses the NCRP data as the basis for its national studies of recidivism of released prisoners, the latest of which, on the 2005 state prison release cohort, was released as a report in April of 2014. The NCRP data were used to draw the sample for the study and to provide information about inmates’ demographic attributes, offenses, sentences, time served, admission type, release methods, parole supervision and additional variables that might be associated with recidivism. The construction of prison term records from the NCRP data in 43 states allows BJS to identify within-state reimprisonment without needing to query the Nlets system for 2005 forward for the majority of jurisdictions. While BJS’s periodic recidivism studies also include measures of rearrest and reconviction in addition to return to prison, the NCRP prison term records will allow BJS to stand up an annual report on reimprisonment for the 43 states and the nation, starting in 2015. This is a less complicated, burdensome, and expensive method that provides more timely information than BJS’s periodic recidivism studies.
The NCRP term records have also permitted researchers, led by BJS’s data collection agent for NCRP, to offer alternative measures of recidivism to the release cohort method. As will be discussed on the section covering external uses of the NCRP data, making estimates of the rate of return to prison using all persons released in a single year ignores the variation in demography, geography, and criminal justice characteristics (including time served, sentencing and offense information) inherent to the individual inmates released during the same year. In particular, it overestimates the recidivism rate by counting each reimprisonment as an event, even if the same individual is returned to prison five times in the five-year follow-up period. The linkage of prison admission, yearend custody, and release records in NCRP allows BJS to follow unique individuals over an extended time frame, and make observations regarding their recidivism patterns by sex, age, race/ethnicity, offense category, or state, regardless of their year of release.
These two measures of recidivism are not mutually exclusive; instead, the method selected will vary depending on the question of interest. If a researcher is interested in inmates who participated in a particular educational program prior to release, or to estimate how many of the departing inmates will be requiring a prison bed in the next year, measuring return to prison of all persons released during the same year is appropriate to make comparisons across the cohort. On the other hand, if a researcher wants to look at the recidivism patterns of sex offenders, or trying to determine the number of all inmates who will ever return to prison at least once, the inmates need not come from the same release cohort. This flexibility in the range of recidivism-related questions that can be answered by NCRP has made the collection valuable for policy issues, and several agencies (e.g. the Bureau of Justice Assistance and the National Institute of Justice) and researchers have shown interest in using the data for post-prison evaluation of programs provided to inmates both before and after release.
Key to both the construction of term records and future release cohort studies is the FBI identification number, which BJS was permitted to collect in the 2012 OMB clearance. Not only does it make the match to criminal history records possible, it allows for cross-state recidivists to be identified in the NCRP term records. The BJS 2005 release cohort study found that about 11% of inmates released were rearrested in a different state within five years. While not all arrests will lead to imprisonment, NCRP can identify how often interstate reimprisonment is occurring, and whether there are patterns of “donor” or “recipient” states. BJS hopes to publish estimates of interstate reimprisonment in 2016.
BJS is committed to linking NCRP with other administrative data to better understand external factors that could contribute to successful reentry into the community by former inmates. During 2014, BJS executed and funded an interagency agreement (IAA) with the Center for Administrative Records Research and Applications (CARRA) at the U.S. Census Bureau’s Center for Economic Studies (CES). The main goal of this IAA is to link the NCRP data to the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) Numident file behind the U.S. Census’ secure firewall, which then allows analysts in the CARRA group to assign a personal identification key (PIK) to each inmate and delete all personal information.
The PIK would let the NCRP data to be linked to a number of federal datasets including: data on receipt of supplemental security income; Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF); public housing and rental assistance history; Department of Housing and Urban Development-insured mortgage loans; SSA’s Death Master File; enrollment in Medicare; and any listing in Census’ decennial census or American Community Survey (ACS). With additional approval, NCRP data could be linked to unemployment insurance (UI) wage data collected by CES through the Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD), as well as to tax returns from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Matching NCRP data to the decennial census or ACS collections is of particular importance, because it allows the capture of entire households. BJS is not interested in the identity of non-criminal justice involved persons, but wants to better understand the household structure from which a prisoner might have come or may return to in the future. Imprisonment affects the entire family or household unit, and understanding the relationship of other members of the household to the prisoner, the type of housing unit and size of the household before, during, or after incarceration could explain some the economic and social support challenges experienced by all upon an inmate’s release at a national level. Once a NCRP inmate PIK is identified, the PIKs of the other individuals in the household can be traced to determine whether they received public benefits, filed for unemployment, or reported a decrease in wages with the removal of the inmate from the household.
In separate initiatives, BJS has reached out to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) to investigate the possibility of linking the NCRP data to these agencies’ datasets. While veterans’ benefits are suspended during imprisonment and health care is provided by the state through the DOCs, released prisoners’ ability to afford and utilize medical care could be an important factor to deterring future recidivism. The passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA, PL 111-148) and expansion of Medicaid in more than half the states could provide many former inmates and their family’s medical insurance. Since 41% of prisoners reported current chronic medical conditions, and 66% of those with current chronic conditions were taking prescription medication to control the condition,7 continuation of care in the community is critical for successful reentry. A case-control matched study of the recidivism rates of former inmates who qualify for ACA or VA health care benefits and those who do not using linked NCRP records could suggest whether access to care should be part of states’ approaches to reducing recidivism.
BJS is requesting OMB clearance in this package to collect 9-digit social security number through NCRP to improve its ability to match to the CARRA and other datasets (discussed in the proposed enhancements section of this application). Full 9-digit SSN is the standard matching identifier for the Veterans Business and Health Administrations (VBA, VHA) data, and in the past, VA has not been receptive to matching NCRP data because it lacked SSN.
Budget-dependent, BJS intends to link the NCRP prison and parole release data to the National Death Index (NDI) at National Center for Health Statistics to examine post-imprisonment mortality. The NDI is a repository of all deaths occurring in the U.S., and includes data on date of death as well as up to 10 cause-of-death codes. A recent study in Washington State has shown that former inmates have an adjusted risk of death that is 3.5 times higher than individuals in the general population,8 and through its Annual Survey of Parole (OMB Control Number 1121-0064), BJS reported that the aggregate number of deaths on parole reached 5,700 in 2012, which puts the crude mortality rate on parole at nearly three times the crude mortality rate in prison during the same year (or 730 per 100,000 vs. 264 per 100,000). A preliminary analysis of NCRP data (which contain information on fact of death), deaths following release from prison are concentrated in the early months after release, and if Binswanger’s research in one jurisdiction holds across other jurisdictions, the majority of post-prison release deaths are preventable deaths, as they are caused by drug overdoses, homicides, and suicides. By comparison, in prison, the majority of inmate deaths are due to medical causes such as cancer and heart disease. This could have major implications on how community supervision and reentry programs like SCA implement substance abuse and mental health treatment in an effort to address preventable mortality.
National estimates of post-prison mortality are required not only to quantify the risk of premature death for released prisoners, but also to produce more accurate recidivism rates by removing these individuals from the number of potential repeat offenders. Given the relatively high annual mortality rates on parole, failure to take mortality into account can affect recidivism estimates, particularly if post prison mortality and recidivism are correlated with risky behaviors that are associated with both outcomes. Former prisoners who return to substance use and abuse, for example, may also be more likely to engage in criminal activities, suggesting that the same causal factors may lead to both mortality and recidivism. In 2013, BJS linked 4 years’ worth of data on persons who died in prison facilities from its Deaths in Custody Reporting Program (DCRP, OMB Control # 1121-0249) to NDI data using only the name, dates of birth and death, sex, race, and state and obtained a 94% match. While the DCRP data are known decedents and should therefore have a record at NDI, the result suggests that administrative data without SSNs can still be successfully matched to other data collections.
In sum, linking the NCRP data to other federal datasets would permit BJS statisticians to address a wide range of questions about post-prison reentry and recidivism including:
What is the rate of unemployment among former prisoners, and how long does it take before former prisoners obtain legal employment?
What is the relationship between employment and recidivism?
What is the death rate of former prisoners over time? Is there a relationship between the time spent in prison, where the inmate received health care, and the length of survival post-prison?
How mobile is the former prisoner population (interstate mobility) and does this affect recidivism rates in each state?
What does prison release do to household income and use of federal and state benefits?
Since some offense categories carry mandatory collateral consequences with their sentences, including rendering any household including a convicted felon ineligible for housing assistance, food stamps, or other public benefits, how does household structure vary before and after prison release?
At what rate do veterans who have been imprisoned renew their relationship with the VA health care system?
What is the relationship between access to/use of health insurance and recidivism? Does this vary by geography, demography, or household structure?
In the current OMB clearance, BJS requests permission to collect inmates’ 9-digit social security numbers (SSN) and address of last residence prior to imprisonment to make linkage of the NCRP records to other administrative data. While SSN is not required to match the NCRP data to many of the aforementioned datasets, and BJS understands that there are issues with the quality of the SSN data captured in the DOC administrative records, the variable is an additional hook on which to link records, and for the VA data, SSN is required. BJS’ efforts to document the availability of SSN and address of last residence is located in the proposed enhancements section.
Emphasize flows and transitions of inmates through the corrections system
The CNSTAT panel’s second major recommendation for BJS corrections statistics was to shift BJS’s focus towards emphasizing flows and transitions through the corrections process. As previously stated, BJS published a report (Prisoners in 2012: Trends in Admissions and Releases 1991-2012, NCJ 243920) on entries and exits to state prisons that relied heavily on NCRP data. Instead of simply reporting past year counts of admissions and releases by type, the NCRP data allowed BJS to look at changes in the sex, race/ethnicity, and offense distributions of admitted and released offenders over time. For example, BJS found that admissions of violent female offenders increased 83% between 1991 and 2011, and that of all black offenders admitted to state prisons, the proportion of those sentenced for drug crimes decreased from 35% in 2006 to 24% in 2011. The report also examined the relatively small change in prison sentence length over time; in 2011, 69% of violent offenders were serving sentences of less than 10 years compared to 64% in 1991. There was no change in the percentage of drug (85%) or property (88%) offenders sentenced to less than 10 years at these two time points. Finally, BJS reported that after lagging behind property and drug offenders in terms of the proportion of all released inmates in 1991, 2001, and 2006, violent offenders comprised about the same percentage of releases as these other crime types in 2011 (about 28% each).
In addition to looking at variation in the length of sentences imposed over time, NCRP term records have shed new light on the calculation of time actually served in prison. Time served from admission to release is of fundamental importance to understanding how prison populations grow and for understanding the impacts of sentencing reforms on prison populations. Most commonly, time served is measured by those released from prison, that is, time served by a release cohort. This measure is useful for some purposes, such as assessing the impacts of time served on recidivism, but it is not useful for other purposes, such as assess the impacts of sentencing reforms on the severity of punishment or for use in forecasting prison populations. For example, if a sentencing reform is implemented at time T, time served by release cohorts would not give good measures of the impacts of the reform because the release cohorts consist of mixtures of admissions cohorts, many of whom entered prior to T. To assess the impacts of sentencing reforms on the severity of punishment, time served needs to be associated with the admissions cohorts at T and subsequent periods. Similarly, using time served by an exit cohort in prison population forecasting will yield biased estimates of the size of future populations unless the prison system is stable (that is, admissions rates are constant and time served is constant). Over the past 30 years, the prison system in the U.S. cannot have been characterized as a stable population.9 For this reason, time served needs to be estimated for persons admitted into prison in addition to those released.
A related issue that combines both sentence length imposed and actual time served is the estimation of the number of prisoners who can be expected to serve long terms behind bars. This is an important component for DOC administrators, since it represents a segment of the prison population who will need bed space regardless of changes in crime rates or sentencing practices. BJS is working with its data collection agent for NCRP to develop survival models for estimating the number of persons expected to stay 20 or more years, using information on time served by persons sentenced for similar crimes under the same sentencing statutes, the year and type of prison admission, and rates of admissions for similar crimes. Providing state DOC administrators with estimates of the size of this subpopulation of prisoners will be a way for BJS to provide its respondents with useful information they can use in planning for capacity in the future.
The NCRP term records also inform the transition of prisoners throughout the imprisonment process and address the flow of prisoners over time at state and national levels. The term records yield several enhancements in measuring prison population changes. One important enhancement is the capacity to generate a stock population for any given day within a year. Prior to the construction of term records, only the yearend stock population was available. Because the term records associate an admission to a release, or if a release is pending, the yearend stock, BJS can use dates on term records to produce the prison population on any given day. Not only does this allow BJS to represent how prison populations fluctuate but also allows BJS to identify seasonal variations that are related to prison population management decisions. If seasonal variation in prison populations reflects choices made by prison officials to address, say, overcrowding or other concerns, then analysts could take advantage of this variation to assess whether otherwise comparable prisoners released at different points throughout the year had comparable recidivism rates. Without the term record construction, the generation of daily prison populations, and the identification of the sources of the daily fluctuations, it would not be possible to capture this potentially important source of variation for the study of recidivism.
Finally, the new PCCS term records will contribute knowledge about the movement of released prisoners into the post-custody programs. By linking the prison and PCCS terms in NCRP, BJS can begin to make statements about the characteristics of persons who succeed or fail on community supervision and examine the balance of sentence time served in prison versus in the community. As states attempt to reduce the costs of incarceration, this ratio may change over time, and can now be captured by NCRP in many states.
Develop and enhance longitudinal datasets to encompass more steps in the criminal justice system
BJS has focused on recreating the NCRP as a longitudinal dataset as opposed to single year snapshots. Construction of the term records obviously supports CNSTAT’s goal, but even in those states for which term records cannot be constructed due to inconsistencies in the identification variables, BJS’s decision to archive multiple years in a single archive file (instead of individual annual files) allows users to look at change over time in terms of size and composition of the prison and PCCS populations.
Many states have offered to provide older data to fill gaps in participation. The Georgia DOC provided the components for prison term records back to 1971, and Arizona, submitting NCRP data for the first time in 2012, provided records back to 2000 during 2013. In addition, 7 states have used unique identifiers for several decades, allowing BJS’s data collection agent to create term records from their data back into the 1990s before the yearend census record (“D”) was collected as part of NCRP. So for several states, prison term records exist for 20-25 years allowing researchers to perform long-term comparisons.
Expansion of NCRP to include individual level records of probation from those agencies with centralized probation and parole reporters would further BJS’s effort to meet CNSTAT’s recommendations of collecting data from more stages in the criminal justice process. Particularly in the absence of consistent court data, probation records could provide BJS with information on the characteristics and movements of persons involved in the corrections system who may or may not ultimately be admitted to prison. As more states experiment with alternative forms of corrections, community supervision and short-term incarceration in local jails, as opposed to prisons, would be captured in individual level probation records. During the next 3 years, BJS will explore whether some states with central reporting agencies can provide individual-level probation records through NCRP. We will seek permission to identify the correct data respondent and ask about the feasibility of extending NCRP to include probation records through BJS’s generic clearance. If a number of states are able to provide these data, BJS will request clearance in its next NCRP OMB package (2018).
As previously discussed, BJS is actively engaging other federal agencies to link NCRP with non-criminal justice databases in the interest of learning about barriers to successful reentry into the community. This would extend the longitudinal reach of NCRP to better address contributing causes to recidivism.
NRC’s report on mass incarceration
In 2014, NRC published a report on the causes and consequences of mass incarceration.10 The most salient recommendation was that state and federal legislators need to reevaluate existing sentencing policies regarding mandatory minimums and long sentences. While data gaps and quality received only passing mention, CNSTAT did say that data collection should focus on three areas: (1) the experience of incarceration and its effects; (2) alternative sentencing policies used in corrections; and (3) the impact of incarceration on communities.
Sentencing data (point 2) are already captured in NCRP, and the inclusion of probation data could provide an understanding of sentences that do not involve imprisonment. By the next clearance date, BJS intends to publish a special report examining the JRI policies, including alternative sentencing laws, implemented in states using NCRP data from 2011-2014. Since states adopted different combinations of policies at different times, comparing across states will be difficult. The report will group states into general categories (those that adopted split sentences, for example, or those that limited parole sentence lengths) and report changes in their prison populations in the aggregate instead of calling out individual states. BJS’s data collection agent has written a whitepaper discussing the use of NCRP as a platform for evaluation, laying out several statistical models that could be used based on the questions asked (Appendix B).
Linking NCRP with non-criminal justice data through CARRA, CMS, and other agencies should allow for BJS to address the effects of imprisonment on individuals post-release (point 1), and examine some of the community impacts (point 3), particularly regarding the immediate family or household of the former inmate if they can be located in the decennial census or ACS. BJS is also requesting permission from OMB to collect the address of residence prior to imprisonment through NCRP. Address data will indicate whether persons from particular areas are more highly represented in state prison through the calculation of city or county imprisonment rates, and when combined with the prison facility name already obtained through NCRP, address of residence can be used to look at issues of contact with family and friends while in prison.
NCRP is uniquely situated to answer policy questions in characterizing and explaining the causes behind the prison population growth during the past decades. If allowed to expand on both the front (probation data) and back (reentry data through linkage to external datasets) ends, it will represent an extremely valuable tool not only in describing how the U.S. got to its present state of mass imprisonment, but also give insights into potential methods of reducing the population, either through diversion from prison admission, or the identification of social and economic characteristics that are important in reducing recidivism after release.
BJS’s recurring uses of NCRP
BJS first and foremost uses the NCRP regularly to generate statistics that are key to understanding changes in the composition of prison populations. Primary among these are BJS efforts to accurately describe the age, race, sex, and offense distributions of state prison populations. Annually, BJS uses NCRP data in combination with other data from the National Prisoners Statistics to estimate these distributions. These estimates are published in the annual Prisoners bulletin.11 White this publication is based primarily on the data from the National Prisoner Statistics collection (NPS; OMB control # 1121-0102), states only supply aggregate counts of admissions, releases, and stock populations to NPS; to describe the flow of state prisoners in terms of the offenses they have committed and their demographic profiles, BJS relies on the individual-level NCRP data.
Beyond the annual Prisoners bulletin, the NCRP data serve as denominators for the annual Mortality in State Prisons statistical tables. As previously stated, NCRP has been the base dataset for BJS recidivism studies, including the most recent report on the recidivism of former prisoners released from 30 states (NCJ 244205) and forthcoming reports on state-level recidivism of this cohort, as well as one exploring differences between the recidivism rates of males and females. The NCRP data were combined with BJS’s prison inmate survey data in reports on the prevalence of imprisonment, last published in 2003 (NCJ 197976). BJS plans to resurrect this periodic report following the completion of the 2016 SPI data collection.
BJS uses the NCRP for special reports to address topical issues in corrections practice. For example, staff are currently working on a paper on the aging of the prison population that focuses on the offenses of older prisoners and the extent to which the upward shift in the age distribution of the prison population arises from changes in the age distribution of prisoners at admission or changes in time served by older prisoners due to differences in offenses. BJS is using the NCRP term records in a study of time served in prison that will result in substantive papers on time served by specific groups of prisoners. Other special topic reports using NCRP data that are planned but not yet underway include: factors affecting changes in racial disparities in prison populations and trends in state parole outcomes. BJS continues to use the NCRP data to study racial and ethnic differences in the state prison population, as well as ways to improve collection of racial and ethnic data across all BJS surveys.
In response to requests for information from various sources, BJS statisticians use NCRP data to respond to questions from state and federal legislators, the press, and general public on issues related to corrections. In particular, NCRP data are used to address issues of trends in demographic and offense distributions over time. Variables describing multiple offenses and the sentencing information associated with these crimes, as well as the type of prison admission, provide a more complete picture of time served in prison, particularly in the calculation of percentage of an original prison sentence actually served. Recently, the race and county of sentencing variables have been of particular interest to persons in the press and general public, and BJS hopes that the introduction of a data analysis tool with somewhat limited crosstabulation capabilities to protect privacy will encourage the use of NCRP by persons who do not wish to obtain access to the entire dataset (see the online data dissemination tools section of this application).
BJS has used data from the NCRP in older reports to document the prevalence of imprisonment (see Lifetime Likelihood of Going to State or Federal Prison, NCJ 160092, rates of recidivism (see Recidivism of Prisoners Released in 1994, NCJ 193427), success rates among parolees over time (see Trends in State Parole, 1990-2000, NCJ 184735), changes in sentencing and time served (see Truth in Sentencing in State Prisons, NCJ 170032), changes in the number of drug offenders entering and exiting prison (see Drugs and Crime on the BJS website: http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/drugs.htm), characteristics of female inmates (see Women Offenders, NCJ 175688), changes in the number of juvenile offenders in prison (see Profile of State Prisoners under Age 18, 1985-97, NCJ 176989).
Proposed enhancements to NCRP to expand its utility to address key issues
BJS requests OMB permission to request the following variables to the prison and parole records collected through NCRP: SSN, address of last residence prior to imprisonment, and the custodial security level at which the inmate is classified. These three variables are easily available in the datasets used to extract the existing NCRP data. The work involved with including them will require nothing more than adding the variable names to the states’ extract programs.
A major goal of BJS is to enhance the power of NCRP as a collection of individual-level administrative records by linking the data to other federal data sources. The addition of inmates’ social security numbers (SSN) and address of last residence prior to imprisonment make linkage of the NCRP records to other administrative data much easier, despite known issues with the quality of the SSN data. In fact, SSN data are required to link with several important datasets, including the UI wage data at LEHD and the health care benefits provided by VA. As previously stated, BJS conducted a survey of state respondents under our generic OMB clearance (#1121-0339) and found that 34 of the 57 NCRP jurisdictions said they could definitely or likely provide SSN as a variable in NCRP. Only 12 refused outright or said it was unlikely BJS would get permission to obtain these data. Appendix C shows the response for each jurisdiction. In a test using prison term record data from 5 states which already supply SSN as part of their NCRP submission, the CARRA group was able to match significantly more records when the 9-digit SSN (96.4% of the 546,907 records submitted) was included along with state, first and last name, race, sex, date of birth as match hooks, compared to 82.2% of prison inmates if SSN was not one of the matching criteria.
Collection of an inmate’s address of residence prior to imprisonment will not only help in linking NCRP to other sources of administrative data, it will also allow BJS to produce accurate imprisonment rates for areas smaller than states. Currently, the only geographic variables captured in NCRP are the custodial state where the inmate is held, the state with legal authority over the inmate, and the county in which the inmate was sentenced. The latter variable is a good substitute for the location of the crime, but is a poor proxy for county of residence. BJS strongly advises researchers against using NCRP to calculate county-level imprisonment rates, since these could overestimate the rate if offenders commit a crime in a county other than that of residence, and are counted in the rate numerator but not in the denominator as a resident. Collecting last known residential address would solve this problem, as well as allowing BJS to make statements on distances between the county of residence and the county in which the crime occurred. Residential address will be requested on prison admission and parole entry records only.
The custodial security level at which an inmate is held gives an indication of the type of environment and control measures enforced for each inmate. While security level might loosely correlate with severity of crime, aberrant behavior, health issues, and sentence length can also change the level at which an inmate is housed. BJS is interested in obtaining this variable not only to release national estimates of persons held at various security levels, but also to use in modeling recidivism. The actual security level at which inmates are held in custody is also important in understanding states’ facility, staffing, and corrections budget needs over time. For example, the distribution of inmate security level in California has changed drastically due to PSR. Since low level offenders will be incarcerated in county jails instead of prison, and only persons with current or past violent offenses will be admitted to prison, the prison population has a high proportion of inmates with long sentences. These violent offenders are typically housed at a higher security facility than the drug or property offenders that comprised a large part of the California prison population before PSR. In the future, California will need to house fewer inmates in minimum-security facilities, women’s prisons, and reception facilities, and has already converted one female-only facility to a low- to medium-security male prison. The legislature has discussed retrofitting medium-security facilities to allow for the housing of maximum security inmates. These changes will impact BJS surveys and facility census data collection. Custodial security level will be collected on the yearend prison custody records.
Each of these new elements increases the risk of inmate identification if the records were to be lost. As a federal statistical agency, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) has several layers of protection to ensure the confidentiality of all data. Under Title 42 of the United States Code, Section 3789, BJS collects data for statistical purposes only, does not release data pertaining to specific individuals, and has in place procedures to guard against disclosure of personally identifiable information. All BJS data are maintained under the security provisions outlined in U.S. Department of Justice regulation 28 CFR §22.23, which can be reviewed at http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/bjsmpc.pdf, and are summarized below:
All BJS data are physically stored in a secure building in Washington, DC which houses only Department of Justice's Office of Justice Programs (including BJS). The building is staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week by armed guards, and employees must pass through an electronic badge swipe and subsequent acknowledgement of their photograph by a guard. Non-federal visitors must be sponsored by Department of Justice employees, and pass through a metal detector as well as record information in a central log book and wear a visitor's badge. Servers containing BJS data are stored in a locked room with access limited only to information technology personnel from the Department of Justice's Office of Justice Programs, and require a badge swipe to enter. OJP has an intruder detection system in the room housing the OJP servers. Should any data need to be stored on CD-ROMs, they reside in a locked office to which only the director and deputy directors have key access, and all data use in this room is logged.
Technical control of the data is maintained through a system of firewalls and encryption. OJP has an intruder detection system in the room housing the OJP servers. BJS maintains the NCRP data on a secure hard drive behind the Department of Justice's firewall which only the program manager, corrections unit chief, and agency director can access, and the data are encrypted to FIPS 201 standards. Access to this drive and any of the files on the drive is limited to BJS statisticians who work on the DCRP and their direct supervisors, and require a username and password verification to log on to the BJS computer system. All Department of Justice employees are required to undergo annual computer security training.
Should BJS decide to destroy data in the future, it will follow all federal government guidelines regarding the technical and physical wiping of data from servers, and any CD-ROMs or paper document that may exist will be cross-cut shredded.
BJS’s data collection agent for NCRP, Abt Associates, Inc. collects all information via secure website. All data are processed at Abt’s secure Cambridge, Massachusetts office on a server that houses solely NCRP data in a locked room, and then passed to BJS via an internal secure FTP website that requires an individual username and password for each user. Abt Associates, Inc. has completed BJS's privacy requirements for collection, maintenance, and analysis of personally identifiable information, including a privacy certificate.
BJS archives the deidentified NCRP data at the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD; www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/NACJD). Under this arrangement, BJS provides NACJD with raw data files, file layouts and a codebook via secure FTP site with individual usernames and passwords for each data project. Prior to sending the data to NACJD, BJS strips all identification numbers and names, and masks the day field in dates in the NCRP data. NACJD modifies these deliverables so they reflect the publicly-available final product. NACJD has agreed that the PII collected in NCRP warrants the archives' second highest level of security, restricted access. Prospective users of the NCRP must provide an application including proof of IRB approval or waiver, a description of their research, and a data use agreement pledging confidentiality.
External research uses of NCRP
BJS makes the NCRP data set available to the public through public use files located at the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data Archive at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/NACJD/series/38/studies/36094?archive=NACJD&sortBy=7). Due to the individual-level data structure, NACJD classified NCRP as a “restricted” collection in 2011, and requiring researchers to write a short justification for their intended use of the data and a data security plan, as well as obtain approval or waiver to use the data from an official institutional review board (IRB). Beginning in 2012, BJS began archiving the NCRP as a set of longitudinal files including data from 2000 through the most recent year, instead of the old method of separate files for each year. The new format includes prison and PCCS term records for all states and years where the linked files could be construction, as well as separate prison and PCCS files for those states and years where it was not deemed feasible to build a term record. BJS also provides code in 3 statistical languages to cut up the file to resemble the “old” method of archiving, as well as create new variables and query particular records or dates. In the future, BJS plans on making the NCRP data even easier to access through an online data tool that will permit the public to do cross-tabulations of limited categories of age, race, sex, offense, and geographic location by year.
As participation in NCRP has increased and the data made more useful through the construction of term records, so has interest in using the data for research purposes. As previously stated, prior to 2011, the NCRP were freely available for download, so anyone could use the data. With the restricted designation, fewer people chose to go through the application process. Still, 1,359 unique persons viewed the documentation on the dataset between 11/1/2012 and the present, including faculty, graduate and undergraduate students. NACJD granted 50 people access to the restricted dataset, including personnel from the Rand Corporation, the Swiss Foundation for Research in the Social Sciences, Yale, Cornell, and Stanford universities, and the London School of Economics.
Dominating the current debate on prison policy are concerns about the size of U.S. prison population and its composition. The National Research Council’s report12 stresses both long prison sentences and increased admissions caused by state and federal laws and policies designed to harshly punish offenders. John Pfaff13 argues that the rapid growth of the prison population after the mid-1970s is not simply due to increased admissions, but a result of a number of factors downstream, including rising crime rates during the 1980s and 1990s, but in particular the increasing aggressiveness of prosecutors in filing charges against persons arrested. He uses the NCRP parole data to show that the other method of entering the prison population, returns of parole violators, did not increase over this time period to account for the prison growth. New commitment admissions, forwarded by changes in prosecutorial behavior, are the driver of the growth according to Pfaff.
Pfaff also challenges the standard narrative of the War on Drugs being responsible for the exponential growth of the state and federal prison populations.14,15 Using NCRP data from the 1980s and 1990s, he suggests that drug imprisonments explain only 20% of the growth in new offenders in state prisons, and an even smaller amount of the parole violation and revocation admissions during this time. He also argues that if the flow through prisons is a measure of punitiveness since most inmates spend a relatively short time in prison, one would expect the number of drug offenders to be high. Instead, his analysis estimated that they accounted for approximately 20% of the flow through prisons.
Using the new NCRP term records, Rhodes et al.16 proposed a new method to calculate return to prison that looks at unique offenders, as opposed to following all persons released during a given year. The latter approach, they argue, overestimates the rate of return by counting persons who cycle through prison more than once, as separate events. While this method might answer policy questions like how often do inmates participating in a pre-release program recidivate, it does not accurately tally the number of persons who ever return to prison. To do that, you need to be able to follow individuals over time, something that can be accomplished using the NCRP term record file. Prior to the linking of the different NCRP parts, identifying individual inmates from one year to the next was impossible. When calculating the return to prison rate of unique offenders using the NCRP term records, the researchers found that only 33% of released inmates recidivated over the study period (17 years), compared to the release cohort method, which produced an estimate of 50% recidivism within 5 years.
The individual-level data of NCRP allows for in-depth examination of the relationships between prisoners’ racial and ethnic distributions and other demographic and criminal justice characteristics, and race remains the topic for which the data are most often used in external research. Annual estimates of race/ethnicity distribution of state prisoners based on NCRP data are routinely used by non-governmental policy advocates such as the Sentencing Project and Human Rights Watch to argue for changes to sentencing and incarceration practices, particularly in relation to specific offense types. More specific research has focused on the larger impact of imprisonment on black communities compared to white, which according to Neal and Rick17 has led to a stagnation in progress for black males. While the gap between blacks and whites in earnings, education, and family income narrowed between 1940 and 1980, the most recent recession and growth in imprisonment disproportionately affected blacks.
Several researchers have incorporated external data with NCRP to contextualize imprisonment by race. Ashley Arnio 18 looked at spatial and temporal variation in black-white imprisonment disparity using NCRP data from the 1980s – 2000s, concluding that blacks were more likely to be imprisoned in areas where they were more economically disadvantaged compared to whites, and that this pattern has been longstanding. Residential patterns were also the focus of Arvanites’ 19 analysis of imprisonment rates for drug offenders by race. Using the 2002 NCRP data, he suggests blacks are more likely to be admitted to prison for drug offenses when they are living in racially mixed metropolitan areas compared to when whites are more isolated.
Heimer et al. 20 include sex in their analysis of the 1983-2003 NCRP data, and come to a different conclusion than Arvaniets, at least for females. Their models find that female imprisonment rates for blacks are higher in areas of high poverty rates and increased concentration of blacks, while those of white women are not affected by either condition. Changes between 2000 and 2009 in the racial distribution of female prisoners are documented by Marc Mauer of the Sentencing Project.21 The number of white women imprisoned in state facilities grew over this time period, while black women decreased. Using the NCRP data, Mauer suggests this is due to a reduction in female drug offenders being imprisoned, which has affected black women more than white women.
An unanticipated consequence of the racial disparity in imprisonment is the loss to follow-up of black males in medical studies.22 Using data from NCRP and SPI to calculate risk of imprisonment among various clinical studies’ participants, Wang et al. estimate the proportion of loss to follow-up that can be attributed to imprisonment. They found that particularly among black men, the results of clinical studies could be seriously comprised because of the high rate of loss and estimated loss due to imprisonment. They argue that the government needs to revisit its restrictions on medical research of prisoners to allow those who had started in clinical studies to continue despite imprisonment.
NCRP data have been used to demonstrate that race and sex patterns observed in sentencing practices also affect actual time served in prison. When offense-related variables (severity of offense, number of counts) are controlled for, black males and females still serve longer prison terms than whites and Hispanics of the same sex. According to Bradley and Engen,23 this is due to longer initial sentences for the same crimes and criminal histories and they are less likely to receive conditional releases from state prison.
NCRP data have also been used to examine the socioeconomic and health characteristics and behavior of released prisoners. Raphael24 and Schnepel25 each use release records from NCRP to discuss the difficulty of former inmates in obtaining legal employment that contributes to recidivism. Women who have opportunities for employment through expanded welfare programs are less likely to be admitted to prison for drug offenses according to a study that combined NCRP, drug use and overdose, and arrest data.26 In a dissertation considering the extent to which community and policy factors, including social disorganization and type of release, affect recidivism more than criminal history of demographic characteristics, Harrison27 combined four states’ NCRP data with housing and crime data. With permission of several state DOCs, NCRP release data were linked with Ryan White Foundation client-level HIV/AIDS treatment data to characterize the behavior of former inmates in obtaining post-prison treatment of the disease. 28,29 The researchers also presented these findings at the 2013 and 2014 UMASS Correctional Healthcare annual meetings. Finally, Patterson 30 uses PCCS data from New York to estimate that for each year spent in prison, parolees experienced a 2-year decline in life expectancy after release.
Other external research utilizing NCRP data has documented the increase in inmates over the age of 50 in four NCRP states,31 mortality of military veterans in three states’ prisons,32 disparity in sentencing of male and female sex offenders,33 and inmate and facility characteristics of persons who escape from prison custody.34 The authors of the paper on growth of older inmates were asked to testify about their findings at the U.S. Senate Committee on Aging in May 2015.
In sum, the NCRP provides data on key national and state level issues in sentencing and correctional policies. Because the data are continuous and comparable among the states, the NCRP allows users to address such issues as current trends in sentencing and time served in prison and on parole, recidivism, rates of success for parole supervision and other key re-entry topics, the impact of mandatory sentencing practices on prison admissions and releases, the adoption of truth in sentencing policies and practices, the changing offense composition of inmates entering, exiting and under custody of the nation’s prisons, and the shifting demographic profile of inmates. If the NCRP was discontinued, decision makers would lose a valuable source of information for criminal justice system planning and policy formulation.
3. Use of Technology
The NCRP data collection uses standardized reporting items. Most participating states provide data on an annual basis, allowing them to use existing computer extraction programs with very minor alterations. Through funding and technical assistance, BJS staff has worked with states to develop these programs, as well as update them when the states migrate to new information technology (IT) systems or database management software.
Data are extracted from individual states’ correctional databases, encrypted, and uploaded to the Abt Associates’ dedicated NCRP server using a password-protected secure File Transfer Protocol (FTP). Secure FTP was first implemented in January 2009 for use in collecting the 2008 NCRP data files, and is currently used by all of the NCRP respondents.
BJS provides the respondents with technical assistance as needed to minimize respondents’ efforts in data collection and to improve data quality control. For example, BJS staff recode state statutes and other offense codes to standard BJS codes, which significantly reduces the burden on participating jurisdictions. Quality control protocols implemented by BJS provide quick identification of out-of-range data values, abnormally high rates of missing data, and compare the current year’s data to previous years’ (if available) to ensure that large changes in the variable-specific and total number of data submitted can be explained by the state data providers. Rapid processing and quality control of the data results in reduced burden for states since any discrepancies can be immediately addressed.
4. Efforts to Identify Duplication
NCRP is not duplicated by any other federal government agency or program. No other program employs uniform criteria and comparable definitions when collecting data of this kind from state corrections agencies. BJS is the only government agency that collects national level data on sentencing, time served in prison and on PCCS, and offense composition for prison admissions, releases, and offenders in the custody of state prisons at year-end.
The Association of State Correctional Administrators (ASCA) conducts a state prison data collection called the Performance Based Measures System (PBMS; http://www.asca.net/system/assets/attachments/8008/PBMS%20KeyIndicators%2011_4_14%20Revised%20Org%20Char%20&%20Measures.pdf?1422895226). This collection requires states to submit data monthly, requests 135 core elements over nine correctional areas, including mental health, budget, personnel, institutional security, and academic education. PBMS obtains some of the variables also collected by NCRP, including prisoner demographics, sentence lengths, and offense distribution, but these are collected only in the aggregate, not on an individual level as in NCRP. The purpose of PBMS, to provide corrections administrators with performance indicators over a period of time to allow for monitoring of the prison system, is very different from NCRP in form and content. BJS uses the NCRP administrative records to describe changes in state correctional populations and measure transitions and outcomes. The PBMS is an aggregate reporting system for state correctional administrators, and ASCA does not currently allow the data to be distribution for research or analysis purposes. Currently, only 24 states provide PBMS with at least half of the core elements on a monthly basis. Over the past few years, BJS has collaborated with ASCA to see where NCRP can be used to supplement PBMS measures, or vice versa. BJS staff attend semi-annual meetings on the PBMS collection, and invites ASCA personnel to speak to state data providers at the annual NCRP meeting sponsored by BJS and the National Institute of Corrections (NIC, part of the Bureau of Prisons).
JusticeXchange is a database maintained by the company Appriss (www.appriss.com) that grew out of the Victim Identification Network Everywhere (VINE) program to notify victims when their offenders have additional interactions with the criminal justice system. The collection consists of individual-level movements of offenders in and out of local jails and 35 state DOCs that are updated on a daily or even hourly basis. The DOC data, however, are highly variable in their completeness for sentencing, offense, type of admission and release, education, and state or federal fingerprint IDs, with more than half of the state DOCs capture reporting values for these items for no inmates. Appriss data also do not include PCCS information. BJS is exploring the use of Appriss data to improve its understanding of jail inmates, but it does not compare in the quality and scope to NCRP.
Similarly, BJS’s National Prisoner Statistics program (NPS), and Annual Surveys of Probation and Parole (ASPP) obtain data on admissions to and releases from state prisons, probation and parole programs, as well as yearend stock populations, and some demographic data. Unlike NCRP, these are aggregate counts, reported to BJS on a yearly basis and used as the official counts of prisoners, probationers, and parolees. These aggregate counts can serve as control totals for weighting, but more detailed disaggregation of the populations, such as racial differences in time served on parole or changes in offense distribution by age groups over time, requires the individual-level data of the NCRP.
In the past, individual researchers have requested datasets encompassing similar elements to NCRP from a subset of state departments of corrections, primarily to obtain variables not collected in NCRP, or to get PII data that are not available to the public through the archived NCRP datasets. If the data are collected in NCRP, BJS encourages states to refer researchers to NACJD so that the state is not duplicating efforts in data provision.
5. Impact on Small Business
Not applicable. The NCRP data collection does not involve small businesses or other small entities. The respondents are state departments of corrections.
6. Consequences of Less Frequent Collection
Given the enhancements achieved by creating term records, less than annual collection of NCRP would greatly limit BJS capability to measure changes in the prison population, assess recidivism and reentry issues, enhance linkage of records to expand coverage of key issues related to prison populations, and measure transitions between stages of the correctional system. In addition, all annually reported measures of change in sex, race, age, and offense (and cross-classifications of these groups) composition of prison populations would be put at risk, as BJS would have to rely on older data and some type of weighting or estimation routine that might be insensitive to changes within any combinations of groups for which BJS produces these estimates. Less than annual collection of the data would prevent BJS from identifying these important changes.
The NCRP data are collected annually, and BJS has devoted resources to help expedite processing of the data in order to enhance its timeliness. Less frequent collection of data would impose burdens on respondents who have set up computerized methods to generate the NCRP data. In some states, data on admissions into and releases from prison are updated in real time, and if NCRP extracts of annual admissions and releases to be requested on a schedule other than annual, some states would only be able to provide records for those prisoners being admitted or released for the most recent twelve months. In addition, as NCRP is the only national data set that contains comparative data for monitoring trends in sentence length and time served, delaying or collecting data less frequently would impact BJS’s and other researchers’ ability to detect changes in sentencing practice that affect prison populations.
7. Special Circumstances Influencing Collection
Not applicable. The NCRP collection is consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.6
8. Federal Register Publication and Outside Consultation
The NCRP collection is consistent with the guidelines in 5 CFR 1320.6. The 60 and 30-day notices for public commentary were published in the Federal Register. One comment from Prison Policy Initiative was received in support of the program.
BJS maintains frequent contact with data providers and data users in an effort to improve data collection, reporting procedures, data analysis, and data presentation. In the case of NCRP specifically, BJS held four data providers’ meetings, the most recent in March 2015, to discuss issues such as instructions for data submission, reporting format, item content, publication, archiving of data, and plans for web tool development.
9. Payment or Gift to Respondents
Not applicable. No payments or gifts are offered to NCRP respondents.
10. Assurance of Confidentiality
Under Title 42 of the United States Code, Section 3789, BJS collects NCRP data for statistical purposes only, does not release data pertaining to specific individuals in the NCRP, and has in place procedures to guard against disclosure of personally identifiable information. NCRP data are maintained under the security provisions outlined in U.S. Department of Justice regulation 28 CFR §22.23, which can be reviewed at: http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/bjsmpc.pdf.
11. Justification for Sensitive Questions
Not applicable. The NCRP questionnaire does not contain any sensitive questions.
12. Estimate Respondent Burden
There are 57 respondents in the NCRP data collection universe including the department of corrections (DOC) in each of the 50 states, the Court Services and Offender Supervising Agency for the District of Columbia (CSOSA), and 6 different contacts for parole data in those states (Alabama, Georgia, Massachusetts, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina) where the DOC does not keep data on parolees. Since our 2012 OMB clearance, the California Youth Authority has turned over reporting responsibilities to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, and New York combined its prison and parole reporting systems under a single department. Data on federal prison inmates are obtained through BJS’s Federal Justice Statistical Program (FJSP), so no burden is placed on the Bureau of Prisons for NCRP.
For the non-participating states, BJS identifies 24 key data elements across the 4 NCRP file types for the respondents to submit during the first year, then asks these respondents to submit the full complement of requested variables starting in the second year of participation, once they have extract programs created.
The costs to respondents incurred as a result of participating in this data collection are costs that would be incurred in the normal course of daily operations, except for the hours involved in preparing the data. Initial participation requires the one-time development of a computer program to extract data to be sent to NCRP. This computer program is then re-run to prepare data for submission in subsequent years. From discussions with both current and potential contributors to the NCRP, BJS estimates the time needed to develop computer programs to extract data and to prepare a response to be 24 hours, per type of database containing the information needed incurred during the first year of participation, and 8 hours per type of database during the second and subsequent years of data provision (prior to the addition of requested new items).
At the beginning of each year, states are contacted by BJS’s data collection agent for a brief phone conversation to confirm that the data respondent has not changed over the past year, and to tell them to expect a packet of materials describing the submission of NCRP data in the next few weeks (see Appendices D and E for scripts for the calls to currently contributing states and those who have not recently contributed). In 2016, the packet for collection of the 2015 NCRP data will contain: an introductory letter from BJS (Appendix F); an introductory letter from the data collection agent (Appendix G); instructions for data submission (Appendix H); and NCRP Frequently Asked Questions fact sheet (Appendix I).
Hour burden for proposed new variables in NCRP
BJS estimates that there will be one additional burden hours per reporting entity due to the addition of needed variables (for more detailed justifications of the need for these changes, please see the Needs section of this supporting statement):
New Variable |
Justification for requesting variable |
Additional burden estimate |
9-digit social security number |
SSN will allow BJS to more easily link NCRP data with other federal data sources, including the National Death Index, unemployment and wage data, SNAP, TANF, and other federal benefits programs |
1 hour (total) |
Address of residence prior to imprisonment |
Will allow BJS to more easily link NCRP data with other federal data sets, as well as provide imprisonment rates for regions smaller than states. Currently, NCRP only captures the county where an inmate is sentenced, which is not a good proxy for county of residence. |
|
Physical security level at which inmate is being held |
This will allow BJS to provide annual estimates of the number of persons held under minimum, medium, and maximum security conditions, a frequent question posed by the public |
Burden hours for prison records (NCRP-1A, NCRP-1B, NCRP-1D)
The development of computer programs during the first year of submission to extract prison records with information on prison admissions (NCRP-1A) and prison releases (NCRP 1-B) is estimated to require a total of 24 hours, as these represent snapshots from the same database. The first year provision of information on persons in prison at year-end (NCRP-1D) is estimated to require an additional 24 hours, as these records reside in a separate database.
During all subsequent years of participation, the average time needed to provide data is expected to be 8 hours per respondent for prisoner admissions and releases (NCRP-1A and NCRP-1B) and 8 hours for data on persons in prison at year-end (NCRP-1D), based on conversations with data providers during follow-up calls. The average of 8 hours per database takes into account that some respondents just need 2 hours to make a copy of a research database, while others may need to do additional work, including modifying computer programs, preparing input data, and documenting the record layout. For 2013, this burden estimate is increased by one hour (to 9 hours for prison admissions and releases and 9 hours for year-end stock populations) from the previous NCRP OMB submission to include modifications to existing data extraction programs needed for SSN, address, and physical security level.
Burden hours for PCCS records (NCRP-1E, NCRP-1F)
The addition of PCCS entry records after the 2012 OMB clearance has gone smoothly. As with the prison data, BJS estimates that for states submitting PCCS records for the first time, 24 hours will suffice to extract both entries and exits, as these are obtained from the same datasets. Subsequent years will require an estimated average of 8 hours for the extraction of entries and exits. In 2016 (collection year 2015), BJS anticipates an extra hour will be needed to modify the existing extraction programs to include SSN and address of residence, for a total of 9 hours.
Burden hours for follow-up consultations
Follow-up consultations with respondents are usually necessary while processing the data to obtain further information regarding the definition, completeness and accuracy of their report. These consultations, usually initiated by email and then followed up with a phone conversation if there is difficulty in understanding the request, vary depending on the data elements that require attention. A sample of 5 states’ follow-up consultations from the 2014 data reporting year is provided in Appendix J to demonstrate the range of issues addressed. Respondents are also asked to review their data after the processing is completed. NCRP review and feedback are estimated to take 3 hours per jurisdiction (note that separate analysts may be responsible for the submission of prison and PCCS data in some jurisdictions; the total review time for all records is estimated at 3 hours).
Total burden hours for submitting NCRP data
Based on submissions for calendar years 2011-2013, BJS anticipates that 49 states will provide NCRP-1A, NCRP-1B, and NCRP-1D data for report year 2015 and 32 states will submit PCCS records (NCRP-1E, NCRP-1F). Including the time needed to review their data submissions, the total respondent burden for report year 2016 among current NCRP participants is expected to be 1,317 hours, as depicted in table 1 below. This is equivalent to roughly 27 hours per respondent currently submitting. BJS plans to make a concerted effort to obtain the 2016 NCRP-1A, NCRP-1B, and NCRP-1D data from the state not currently submitting prison records, and the NCRP-1E and NCRP-1F PCCS data from the outstanding 18 states. The total burden estimate for these newly submitting states is 510 hours. The total burden for provision of NCRP data across the states we anticipate will participate in 2016 (report year 2015) is 1,827 hours.
In 2017 (report year 2016), BJS expects to have all 50 states providing NCRP prison data, and 40 states submitting PCCS records (table 2). For states that had previously submitted, the burden estimate in 2017 is 1,270 hours. The remaining non-reporting PCCS states would need 267 hours to create data extraction programs and begin data submission. The total burden for provision of NCRP data in 2017 is anticipated to be 1,537.
In 2018 (report year 2017), BJS expects to have all 50 states providing NCRP prison data, and 40 states submitting PCCS records (table 3). For states that had previously submitted, the burden estimate in 2017 is 1,310 hours. The remaining non-reporting PCCS states would need 147 hours to create data extraction programs and begin data submission. The total burden for provision of NCRP data in 2018 is anticipated to be 1,457.
Table 1. Estimated time burden for states submitting NCRP data in 2016 (report year 2015)
SUBMISSIONS |
FILES |
Data review3,4 |
TOTAL
|
|||||
Prison data |
PCCS data1,2 |
|||||||
NCRP-1A |
NCRP-1B |
NCRP-1D |
NCRP-1E |
NCRP-1F |
||||
States currently submitting to NCRP |
1,317 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
49 |
49 |
49 |
32 |
32 |
49 |
||
|
49 |
49 |
49 |
27 |
27 |
49 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
5 |
5 |
5 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
9 hours |
9 hours |
9 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
441 hours |
441 hours |
288 hours |
147 hours |
||||
States not currently submitting to NCRP |
510 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
1 |
1 |
1 |
19 |
19 |
2 |
||
|
1 |
1 |
1 |
17 |
17 |
1 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
2 |
1 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
24 hours |
24 hours |
24 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
24 hours |
24 hours |
456 hours |
6 hours |
||||
Total submissions and burden in 2016 (report year 2015) |
1,827 hours4 |
|||||||
Number of states |
50 |
50 |
50 |
51 |
51 |
51 |
||
|
50 |
50 |
50 |
44 |
44 |
43 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
7 |
7 |
7 |
||
Estimated total burden |
465 hours |
465 hours |
744 hours |
153 hours |
||||
1While there are 50 states providing prison data, 51 jurisdictions are eligible to report PCCS data. As of December 31, 2001, sentenced felons from the District of Columbia are the responsibility of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The District of Columbia’s PCCS data, however, are reported by the Court Services and Offender Supervising Agency for the District of Columbia (CSOSA).
2In six states and the District of Columbia, a different respondent reports data for NCRP-1E and NCRP-1F (PCCS entry and exit records. Currently, five of these seven jurisdictions submit PCCS data on an annual basis to NCRP. The estimated burden for data review is still assumed to be 3 total hours per NCRP submission of 7 parts, even though two different people in these jurisdictions will separately review the PCCS records (2 files) and the prison records (3 files).
3The number of states, respondents, and burden hours in the data review column subtotals will not sum to the total submissions and burden hours, since these values reflect the maximum number of states and respondents that will need to review at least one submitted file of NCRP.
4The estimated total burden for all 2016 submissions will not be the sum of the estimated subtotals of states currently and not currently submitting NCRP records because of the data review estimate issue described above.
Table 2. Estimated time burden for states submitting NCRP data in 2017 (report year 2016)
SUBMISSIONS |
FILES |
Data review3,4 |
TOTAL
|
|||||
Prison data |
PCCS data1,2 |
|||||||
NCRP-1A |
NCRP-1B |
NCRP-1D |
NCRP-1E |
NCRP-1F |
||||
States currently submitting to NCRP |
1,270 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
50 |
50 |
50 |
40 |
40 |
50 |
||
|
50 |
50 |
50 |
34 |
34 |
50 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
6 |
6 |
6 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
8 hours |
8 hours |
8 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
400 hours |
400 hours |
320 hours |
150 hours |
||||
States not currently submitting to NCRP |
267 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
0 |
0 |
0 |
11 |
11 |
1 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
10 |
10 |
0 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
0 hours |
0 hours |
24 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
0 hours |
0 hours |
264 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Total submissions and burden in 2017 (report year 2016) |
1,537 hours4 |
|||||||
Number of states |
50 |
50 |
50 |
51 |
51 |
51 |
||
|
50 |
50 |
50 |
44 |
44 |
43 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
7 |
7 |
7 |
||
Estimated total burden |
400 hours |
400 hours |
584 hours |
153 hours |
||||
1While there are 50 states providing prison data, 51 jurisdictions are eligible to report PCCS data. As of December 31, 2001, sentenced felons from the District of Columbia are the responsibility of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The District of Columbia’s PCCS data, however, are reported by the Court Services and Offender Supervising Agency for the District of Columbia (CSOSA).
2In six states and the District of Columbia, a different respondent reports data for NCRP-1E and NCRP-1F (PCCS entry and exit records. Currently, five of these seven jurisdictions submit PCCS data on an annual basis to NCRP. The estimated burden for data review is still assumed to be 3 total hours per NCRP submission of 7 parts, even though two different people in these jurisdictions will separately review the PCCS records (2 files) and the prison records (3 files).
3The number of states, respondents, and burden hours in the data review column subtotals will not sum to the total submissions and burden hours, since these values reflect the maximum number of states and respondents that will need to review at least one submitted file of NCRP.
4The estimated total burden for all 2017 submissions will not be the sum of the estimated subtotals of states currently and not currently submitting NCRP records because of the data review estimate issue described above.
Table 3. Estimated time burden for states submitting NCRP data in 2018 (report year 2017)
SUBMISSIONS |
FILES |
Data review3,4 |
TOTAL
|
|||||
Prison data |
PCCS data1,2 |
|||||||
NCRP-1A |
NCRP-1B |
NCRP-1D |
NCRP-1E |
NCRP-1F |
||||
States currently submitting to NCRP |
1,310 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
50 |
50 |
50 |
45 |
45 |
50 |
||
|
50 |
50 |
50 |
39 |
39 |
50 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
6 |
6 |
6 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
8 hours |
8 hours |
8 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
400 hours |
400 hours |
360 hours |
150 hours |
||||
States not currently submitting to NCRP |
147 hours |
|||||||
Number of states |
0 |
0 |
0 |
6 |
6 |
1 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
5 |
5 |
0 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
||
Estimated burden/response |
0 hours |
0 hours |
24 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Subtotal |
0 hours |
0 hours |
144 hours |
3 hours |
||||
Total submissions and burden in 2018 (report year 2017) |
1,457 hours4 |
|||||||
Number of states |
50 |
50 |
50 |
51 |
51 |
51 |
||
|
50 |
50 |
50 |
44 |
44 |
43 |
||
|
0 |
0 |
0 |
7 |
7 |
7 |
||
Estimated total burden |
400 hours |
400 hours |
504 hours |
153 hours |
||||
1While there are 50 states providing prison data, 51 jurisdictions are eligible to report PCCS data. As of December 31, 2001, sentenced felons from the District of Columbia are the responsibility of the Federal Bureau of Prisons. The District of Columbia’s PCCS data, however, are reported by the Court Services and Offender Supervising Agency for the District of Columbia (CSOSA).
2In six states and the District of Columbia, a different respondent reports data for NCRP-1E and NCRP-1F (PCCS entry and exit records. Currently, five of these seven jurisdictions submit PCCS data on an annual basis to NCRP. The estimated burden for data review is still assumed to be 3 total hours per NCRP submission of 7 parts, even though two different people in these jurisdictions will separately review the PCCS records (2 files) and the prison records (3 files).
3The number of states, respondents, and burden hours in the data review column subtotals will not sum to the total submissions and burden hours, since these values reflect the maximum number of states and respondents that will need to review at least one submitted file of NCRP.
4The estimated total burden for all 2018 submissions will not be the sum of the estimated subtotals of states currently and not currently submitting NCRP records because of the data review estimate issue described above.
The total burden estimate for 2016 (report year 2015) of 1,317 hours for respondents currently submitting NCRP data has increased from the 2012 estimate of 1,200 hours due to the increase in the number of states submitting prison records (9 additional responses). As previously stated, the burden estimates for all types of existing NCRP records (prison, PCCS) have been increased by one hour for the submission of 2015 data to accommodate extra time needed to program the extraction of SSN, address of last known residence, and inmate security level.
The burden of 510 hours for new NCRP submissions for report year 2015 (states not submitting 2014 or earlier data) represents a decrease from the 2012 estimated burden of 930, due almost exclusively to the increased participation in NCRP over the past three years. Together, the total burden estimate for all states in 2016 (report year 2015) is 1,827. BJS anticipates this burden estimate will fall in 2017 and 2018 as more states provide PCCS records.
13. Estimate of Cost Burden
The costs to respondents incurred as a result of participating in this data collection are costs that would be incurred in the normal course of daily operations.
14. Estimated Cost to Federal Government
The estimated costs for collection, processing, and dissemination of the NCRP data in 2015 is $1,065,408, including:
$922,304 -- Abt Associates, Inc.
$579,607 for data collection, data processing, and program management
$273,860 for computer programming, providing data, furnishing publication-ready tables, conducting research on data
$68,837 in miscellaneous charges -- costs related to postage, telephone calls, disks to respondents, printing, travel to NCRP data providers meeting, etc.
$143,104 -- Bureau of Justice Statistics
60% GS-14, Statistician ($72,000)
10% GS-15, Supervisory Statistician ($14,000)
Fringe benefits (@28% of salaries -- $24,080)
Other administrative costs (@30% of salary & fringe $33,024)
15. Reasons for Change in Burden
The estimate of 1,827 hours for states to compile and submit the five parts of the NCRP in report year 2015 has decreased since the collection’s previous OMB clearance due to the number of new states submitting one or more data files in the past three years, as well as the adoption by all states of secure data transfer protocols without the involvement of time and cost spent on magnetic media preparation.
16. Project Schedule and Publication Plan
BJS’s plans for products and publications from NCRP data over the next three years fall into three categories and include the following (a calendar of proposed publications is located at the conclusion of this section):
BJS technical and methodological reports
Designed to showcase new methodologies that apply to a BJS statistical program or series, BJS and its data collection agent for NCRP will publish BJS technical reports on techniques developed using NCRP data. These documents will describe the details of the processes and procedures, and may form the basis for future annual or periodic BJS reports. Four reports using NCRP to demonstrate new techniques and methodologies are currently planned:
Estimating Prison Time-Served with Piecewise Constant Hazard Models: Problems and Applications using National Corrections Reporting Program Data. Originally planned and written for publication in 2013, other priorities delayed the review and release of this technical/methodological report. The paper will describe the methodology, assess it relative to Monte Carlo simulations, and illustrate the use of the methodology in estimating time served for several population groups. The new publication date is fall of 2016.
Estimating Long-Term Prison Stays among Current Prison Populations. Explains a survival model for persons currently in prison that can be used by correctional administrators to predict the number of long-term prisoners for whom they will need to provide accommodation in the coming years. A draft version is presented in Appendix K. The anticipated publication date is late 2016.
Comparison of Self-Reports and Administrative Records for Measuring Criminal Histories: The 2015-2016 Survey of Prison Inmates (SPI) proposes to link in-person survey records to NCRP data to NCRP to quantify the agreement between self-reported criminal history and administrative records of those histories. Estimated publication date is mid to late 2017.
Desistance: This report will apply latent class analysis (as opposed to currently used trajectory models) to examine persons who abstain from behaviors that could otherwise result in returns to prison. Will incorporate sentencing structures and corrections practices unique to each state, individual covariates from the NCRP data, and potentially other data from the CARRA group (marital and employment status, etc.). Estimated publication date is late 2017.
BJS Bulletins
BJS bulletins provide the “first cut” from a routinely done statistical collection. As described previously, BJS will use the NCRP primarily to augment the National Prisoners Statistics to report annually on changes in the age, sex, race, and offense composition of the prison population at yearend, prison admissions during the year, prison releases during the year and expected time served upon admission. BJS will use the NCRP data in the production of three annual bulletins that are issued from the National Prisoners Statistics:
Prisoners in 2014 (expected release September 2015)
Prisoners in 2015 (expected release August 2016)
Prisoners in 2016 (expected release August 2017)
Beginning in 2016, BJS will release annual state-level return-to-prison recidivism estimates using the NCRP term records. As more states provide FBI identification numbers, BJS should also be able to track inmates who serve terms in different states and the federal Bureau of Prisons. These reports will be published in January of each year:
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2014 (expected release January 2016)
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2015 (expected release January 2017)
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2016 (expected release January 2018)
The NCRP age, sex, and race data are used to estimate the demographic distribution of state prisoners in the Correctional Population in the United States bulletins:
Correctional Population in the United States, 2014 (expected release December 2015)
Correctional Population in the United States, 2015 (expected release December 2016)
Correctional Population in the United States, 2016 (expected release December 2017)
BJS also uses the NCRP in its work on Deaths in Custody (OMB # 1121-0249). Specifically, BJS uses the NCRP to create denominators in calculating mortality rates for the state prison population. Using the NCRP term records, BJS will be able to generate improved estimates of the average daily prison population by specific demographic characteristic for which mortality rates are calculated (e.g., age, race, sex, etc.). The reports that will utilize the NCRP include:
Prison and Jail Deaths in Custody, 2000-2013 Statistical Tables (expected released July 2015)
Prison and Jail Deaths in Custody, 2000-2014 Statistical Tables (expected release July 2016)
Prison and Jail Deaths in Custody, 2000-2015 Statistical Tables (expected release July 2017)
Special topic reports
Seven special topic reports that rely heavily on the NCRP data are planned:
Aging prison population: This report, originally expected to be released in 2013 but currently in the publication queue, will describe trends in the age distribution of the prison population over the past 20 years, describe the differences between older prisoners (e.g., 55 plus) and those in younger age groups on arrests, offenses and admissions. (Expected release, December 2015).
Mobility of former prisoners: This report will be based on the CARRA match to the decennial censuses, tax records. For prisoners released before the 2010 decennial census, BJS and CARRA will look at interstate mobility. If households of prisoners can be identified, we will examine whether the household moves during or after a period of imprisonment. (Expected release, late 2016).
Death rate of released prisoners: Using the SSA’s Death Master File (DMF), BJS and CARRA can determine the die-off rate of persons by various characteristics, including age, race, and type of release. (Expected release, early 2017).
Racial disparities in imprisonment: Using NCRP as well as the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR) arrest data, this report will examine differences in race across the criminal justice process, from arrest, to prison admission (acting as a proxy for conviction), time spent in prison, and release from prison, as well as return to prison. (Expected release, late 2017).
Recidivism of persons released from state prison in 2012: A follow-up to the 2014 report on recidivism of state prisoners released in 2010, this report will contain more states and provide 3-year recidivism rates for rearrest, reconviction, and return to prison. (Expected release, early 2018).
Housing of released prisoners: Using the linked HUD and decennial census data from CARRA, BJS will examine the housing arrangements for former prisoners. Since convicted felons are not allowed to receive Section 8 assistance, and in many states households receiving housing and other benefits may not include a convicted felon, this report will look at how and where released inmates live. (Expected release, mid 2018).
Employment of released prisoners: Relying on the matched NCRP-CARRA datasets (this would require permission to use the LEHD data, and only for states that have SSN data), BJS and Census will jointly publish a report looking at the employment rate of former prisoners, as well as the types of jobs they work. The rate of return to prison will also be examined by whether a person is employed or not. (Expected release, late 2018).
Online data dissemination tools
In July of 2013, BJS released the Corrections Statistical Analysis Tool (CSAT-Prisoners) on its website (http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=nps). This tool relies primarily on data from the NPS program, but also incorporates data from NCRP. The tool has both dynamic table-building capabilities, as well as static quick tables that allow users to download longitudinal trend data for standard measures (yearend population, admissions, releases, etc.) by sex and state from 1978-2013. BJS updates this tool annually, and it is widely used by the media, students, and researchers to provide answers to routine requests for counts of prison populations and estimates of characteristics of the prison population.
The NCRP data were archived at the National Archive of Criminal Justice Data (NACJD) in a new format starting in 2012. Instead of designating a year and type of record, researchers who obtained access to the data could download the entire 2000-2011 dataset, which included term records for those states with records that enabled linkage, a second file of records for the states and years where linkage was not possible, and a third file of PCCS records. Annually, the three files are updated as new states submit data and new links are formed in the term records. BJS prepared extensive documentation to guide users, and provided programs in SAS, SPSS, and STATA that allowed experienced users to carve up the term records and combine them with the non-linked records to get a file that resembled past archived files, rename the variables to the old naming convention, and define specific time periods within the term record file.
Due to the individual-level records of NCRP, NACJD has classified it as a restricted dataset, even though identifiers and day fields in dates are excised before BJS sends the file to NACJD. The categorization of the dataset as restricted means that any member of the public who wishes to get access to the data must obtain approval or a waiver from an institutional review board (IRB), demonstrate that they have adequate data security to safely download and maintain the NCRP data, and write a description of their project to justify use of the data. Because this limits access to the data, BJS created an abbreviated version of NCRP at NACJD that will be fully accessible by the public. This dataset includes some demographic information (sex, a combination of the race and Hispanic ethnicity variables, and calculated age in 10-year intervals, education level), as well as most serious offense collapsed into the standard BJS categories (violent, property, drug, public order, other), sentence length and time served divided into intervals, high level categories of type of admission and release, and the state where the inmate is being held in custody. While this dataset will also have individual-level records, the aggregation of criminal justice variables, removal of all dates, aggregation of age, sentence length, and time served into categories, and lack of lower-level geographic variables should make individual identification nearly impossible. This dataset should make NCRP data widely available to users who want to answer single questions or who don’t need to have the full complement of NCRP variables to answer their questions. The dataset was securely transferred to NACJD on June 24, 2015, and awaits their disclosure review.
Prior to the archiving of this abbreviated dataset, BJS expects to release an online analysis tool using the NCRP data at https://www.ncrp.info/SitePages/Home.aspx, where the state fact sheets on corrections policies already exist. Users will access this tool from the BJS website, but it will be housed by BJS’ NCRP data collection agent due to the large size of the underlying dataset. The tool would allow users to choose between prison and PCCS analyses, single or multiple years, and their population of interest (admissions, releases, or prison stock). They will be permitted to do crosstabulations of general offense categories, sex, race, age cohorts, type of admission or release, and collapsed categories of sentence length and time served. BJS wants to the tool to produce national-level estimates, as well as allowing for state-level analysis if possible. The exact number of years and variables that can be included in an analysis will depend on the size of the matrix, which dictates computation time, and cells with fewer than 10 individuals will be masked to protect privacy.
BJS Calendar for NCRP Documentation/Publications/Products
Type of publication/product |
Title/topic of publication/product |
Approximate date of release |
Technical report |
Estimating Prison Time Served with Piecewise Hazard models |
September 2016 |
Technical report |
Estimating long term prison stays among current prison populations |
November 2016 |
Technical report |
Comparison of self-reports and administrative records for measuring criminal histories |
November 2017 |
Technical report |
Desistance |
December 2017 |
BJS Bulletin |
Prisoners in 2014 |
September 2015 |
BJS Bulletin |
Prisoners in 2015 |
August 2016 |
BJS Bulletin |
Prisoners in 2016 |
August 2017 |
BJS Bulletin |
Correctional Population in the United States, 2014 |
December 2015 |
BJS Bulletin |
Correctional Population in the United States, 2015 |
December 2016 |
BJS Bulletin |
Correctional Population in the United States, 2016 |
December 2017 |
BJS Bulletin |
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2014 |
January 2016 |
BJS Bulletin |
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2015 |
January 2017 |
BJS Bulletin |
Returns to State Prisons, 2000-2016 |
January 2018 |
BJS Special Report |
Aging prison population |
December 2015 |
BJS Special Report |
Mobility of former prisoners |
December 2016 |
BJS Special Report |
Death rate of released prisoners |
February 2017 |
BJS Special Report |
Racial disparities in imprisonment |
December 2017 |
BJS Special Report |
Housing of released prisoners |
August 2018 |
BJS Special Report |
Employment of released prisoners |
November 2018 |
BJS CSAT – Prisoners Web Data Analysis Tool |
NPS/NCRP data tool |
Annual updates to release in tandem with Prisoners bulletin |
Limited Dataset for Unrestricted Public Use |
NCRP data (limited) |
January 2016 |
NCRP Web Data Analysis Tool |
NCRP data (limited) |
October 2018 |
17. Expiration Date Approval
The OMB Control Number and the expiration date will be published on instructions provided to all respondents.
18. Exceptions to the Certification Statement
There are no exceptions to the Certification Statement. The collection is consistent with all the guidelines set forth in 5 CFR 1320.9.
1 Tracey Kyckelhahn (2015). “Justice Expenditure and Employment Extracts 2012”, BJS statistical tables, NCJ 248628.
2 E. Ann Carson (2014). “Prisoners in 2013”, BJS annual report, NCJ 247282.
3 Nancy La Vigne, Samuel Bieler, Lindsey Cramer, Helen Lo, Cybele Kotonias, Debbie Mayer, Dave McClure, Laura Pacifici, Erika Parks, Bryce Peterson, Julie Samuels (2014). Justice Reinvestment Initiative State Assessment Report. Urban Institute, http://www.urban.org/research/publication/justice-reinvestment-initiative-state-assessment-report.
4 E. Ann Carson, Daniela Golinelli (2013). “Prisoners in 2012: Trends in Admissions and Releases 1991-2012”, BJS annual report, NCJ 243920.
5 See: Chiu T, 2010. It’s About Time: Aging Prisoners, Increasing Costs, and Geriatric Release. New York: Vera Institute of Justice; or American Civil Liberties Union, 2012. At America’s Expense: The Mass Incarceration of the Elderly. New York.
6 National Research Council (2009). “Ensuring the Quality, Credibility, and Relevance of U.S. Justice Statistics. A Panel to Review the Programs of the Bureau of Justice Statistics”. Robert M. Groves and Daniel L. Cork, eds. Committee on National Statistics and Committee on Law and Justice, Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
7 Laura M. Maruschak, Marcus Berzofsky, and Jennifer Unangst (2015). “Medical problems of state and federal prisoners and jail inmates, 2011-12”, BJS special report, NCJ 248491.
8Ingrid A. Binswanger, Marc F. Stern, Richard A. Deyo, Patrick J. Heagerty, Allen Cheadle, Joann G. Elmore, and Thomas D. Koepsell (2007). “Release from prison – a high risk of death for former inmates”, New England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 356, pp. 157-165.
9For a discussion of these issues related to time served and stable populations, see Evelyn J. Patterson and Samuel H. Preston (2007), “Estimating mean length of stay in prison: methods and applications”, Journal of Quantitative Criminology, Vol. 24, pp. 33-49.
10 Jeremy Travis, Bruce Western, Steve Redburn, eds. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences. National Research Council, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.
11 See, for example Prisoners in 2013 (NCJ 247282), tables 7 and 8 for NCRP data used to show the sex, race, and age distributions of prisoners, and tables 13 and 14 for the state offense distributions. Earlier years of the Prisoners report also show these tables, as well as incorporating NCRP data in estimates of time served by offense, sentence length by admission type, and in-depth analyses of state policy initiatives.
12 See 10.
13 John Pfaff (2011), “The micro and macro causes of prison growth”, Georgia State University Law Review, Vol. 28, Issue 4, Article 9.
14 John Pfaff (2015). “The war on drugs and prison growth: limited importance, limited legislative options”, forthcoming in Harv J Legislation.
15 John Pfaff (2012). “Waylaid by a metaphor: a deeply problematic account of prison growth”, Mich L Rev, Vol. 111, pp. 1087-1110.
16 William Rhodes, Gerald Gaes, Jeremy Luallen, Ryan King, Tom Rich, and Michael Shively (2014), “Following incarceration, most released offenders never return to prison”, Crime & Delinquency, DOI: 10.1177/0011128714549655.
17 Derek Neal and Armin Rick (2014), “The Prison Boom and the Lack of Black Progress after Smith and Welch”, National Bureau of Economic Research working paper, number 20283.
18 Ashley N. Arnio (2014), “Unpacking the Sources of Racial Disparities in U.S. Imprisonment Rates: A County-Level Assessment of Historical Origins and Contemporary Social, Economic, and Political Conditions”, Ph.D. dissertation, Florida State University.
19 Thomas Arvanites (2013), “Segregation and African-American imprisonment rates for drug offenses”, Soc Sci J, Vol. 51, Issue 3, pp. 431-437.
20 Karen Heimer, Kecia R Johnson, JB Lang, Andres F Rengifo, and Don Stemen (2012), “Race And Women’s Imprisonment: Poverty, African American Presence, And Social Welfare”, J Quant Crim, Vol 28, Issue 2, pp. 219-244.
21 Marc Mauer (2013), “The Changing Racial Dynamics of Women’s Incarceration”, The Sentencing Project, Washington, DC.
22 Emily A. Wang, Jenerius A. Aminawung, Christopher Wildeman, Joseph S. Ross, and Harlan M. Krumholz (2014), “High incarceration rates among black men enrolled in clinical studies may compromise ability to identify disparities”, Health Affairs, Vol. 33, No. 5, pp. 848-855.
23 Mindy S. Bradley and Rodney L. Engen (2014), “Leaving prison: A multilevel investigation of racial, ethnic, and gender disproportionality in correctional release”, Crime and Delinquency pp.1-27.
24 Steven Raphael (2014), “The New Scarlet Letter? Negotiating the U.S. Labor Market with a Criminal Record”, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research working paper series.
25 Kevin T. Schnepel (2014), “Good Jobs and Recidivism”, The University of Sydney working paper series.
26 Hope Corman, Dhaval M. Dave, Dhiman Das, and Nancy E. Reichman (2013), “Effects of welfare reform on illicit drug use of adult women”, Economic Inquiry, Vol. 51, No. 1, pp. 653-674.
27 Paige M. Harrison (2012), “The Impact of Individual, Community, and Public Policy Factors on Offender Recidivism in Four States: Bad People, Bad Places, or Bad Policy?” Ph.D. dissertation, American University.
28 Brian T. Montague, David L. Rosen, Liza Solomon, Amy Nunn, Traci Green, Michael Costa, Jacques Baillargeon, David A. Wohl and David P Paar; Josiah D. Rich on behalf of the LINCS Study Group (2012), “Tracking linkage to HIV care for former prisoners: A public health priority”, Virulence, Vol. 3, No. 3, pp 319-324.
29 R. Gutman, C.J. Sammartino, T.C. Green, and B.T. Montague (2015), “Error adjustments for file linking methods using encrypted unique client identifier (eUCI) with application to recently released HIV+ prisoners”, Stat in Med, publication forthcoming.
30 Evelyn J. Patterson (2013), “The dose-response of time served in prison on mortality: New York State, 1989-2003”, Am J Pub Health Vol. 103, No. 3, pp. 523-528.
31 Jeremy Luallen and Ryan Kling (2014), “A method for analyzing changing prison populations: explaining the growth of the elderly in prison”, Eval Rev, Vol. 38, No. 6, pp. 459-486.
32 Jeremy Luallen and Nida Corry (2015), “On the prevalence of veteran deaths in state prisons”, Crim Jus Pol Rev, pp. 1-18.
33 Randa Embry and Phillip M. Lyons, Jr. (2012), “Sex-based sentencing: sentencing discrepancies between male and female sex offenders”, Fem Crim, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 146-162.
34 Bryce E. Peterson (2015), “Inmate-, Incident-, and Facility-Level Factors Associated with Escapes from Custody and Violent Outcomes”, Ph.D. dissertation, City University of New York.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| Author | Ann |
| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 2021-01-24 |