Since 1980, there has been an almost tenfold increase in the federal prison population. The current population is about 218,000 offenders and growth is expected to continue, according to a new report.
In 2011, the population grew by 7,541. By the end of 2013, there will be about 11,500 additional offenders in federal prisons, according to a new report by the Urban Institute’s Justice Policy Center.
Overcrowding, sentencing disparities, cost-effectiveness are of particular concern in operating the federal prison system, the report finds.
The 2013 fiscal year budget allocates $6.9 billion for the federal prison system — $278 million more than 2012 and more than 25 percent of the budget for the Department of Justice. The report said if present trends continue, the BOP will consume 30 percent of the DOJ budget by 2020.
“In these fiscally lean times, funding the expanding [Board of Prisons] population crowds out other priorities,” the report said.
The report found that the primary drivers for the inmate population are “front-end decisions about who goes to prison and for how long.” From 2000 to 2010, the number of sentenced offenders increased by about 40 percent, primarily from immigration charges.
More than half of the population is drug offenders, and 15 percent are people who violated probation or parole.
The report makes several recommendations for slowing population growth, including reducing the length of sentences, particularly for drug offenders, and improving community corrections to reduce recidivism and parole and probation violations
In the federal prison system, a minimum-security prisoner costs about $21,000 annually to incarcerate. Low-security offenders cost $25,378 each; medium-security $26,247; and high-security $33,930. In comparison, each Californian prisoner costs more than $50,000 per year, costing the state $8.6 billion per year.
