Virginia prison and jail populations dropping

A little more than a year ago, state officials warned that so many people were being locked up in Virginia that it might take a new prison a year at a cost of $100 million each to keep pace. Instead, the number of people being sent behind bars has slowed to the point, for the moment at least, that the population of state prisons and local jails is dropping. No one is fully sure why it is happening or whether it will last. But after decades of steady growth, the news is welcome on a number of fronts, particularly for the strapped state budget, which dedicates more than $1 billion a year for prisons. Prisons are where long-term felons are sent to serve their sentences; local and regional jails primarily hold people awaiting trial and those serving relatively short sentences. According to state figures: - The number of inmates in prisons grew an average of almost 3 percent a year from 2001 to the end of June 2008. Since then, it has dropped by 1.1 percent, or more than 400 inmates. - The average daily population of jails grew 5 percent a year from 2001 through 2007. However, in 2008 the number of jail inmates declined 1.7 percent, and it has fallen almost 3 percent this year. Barry R. Green, director of the Vir-ginia Department of Juvenile Justice, has been assisting in forecasts of inmate populations for more than two decades. “This is the first time I’ve seen an annual decline in the number of state inmates and a two-year decline in jail inmates since I’ve been involved in the process,“ Green said. “While we can find explanations for part of the drop, we haven’t yet been able to [explain] it in total and are still trying to determine whether this trend will continue.“ There are about 33,200 inmates in state prisons and nearly 28,000 in local and regional jails, of which almost 6,000 are “state-responsible inmates” awaiting transfer to a state prison. Each year, about one-third of the state prison population enters, and one-third leaves. Several factors contributing to decreased prison population The recent declines are believed to be the result of a number of causes. According to state police, while some types of crime have shown increases, violent crime—which can lead to stiff prison sentences—has been down two years in a row across the state, by 4.7 percent in 2008 and by 2.6 percent in 2007. In a recent report to a legislative subcommittee, officials pointed to several other factors believed to be contributing to the slowing number of inmates entering prisons and jails. A backlog in forensic testing—such as determining whether a substance is an illegal drug—performed by the Virginia Department of Forensic Science grew from 2003 to 2006. But with a budget boost, by 2008 the backlog was reduced by 70 percent. That, in turn, eased the backlog of people in jail awaiting trial, lowering the average jail population. Also, felony drug arrests in the third quarter of 2008 were nearly 9 percent below the same period the year before, and the number of people in jail awaiting trial for felony drug charges dropped 26 percent from December 2006 to December 2008. The report noted that with tight budgets, police departments may freeze vacancies and reduce overtime, actions that could lead to fewer arrests. Virginia not alone in trend Things aren’t slowing down only in Virginia. Federal figures show that from June 2007 to June 2008, the country’s jail population grew 0.7 percent, the smallest increase in 27 years. In the first half of 2008, the nation’s prison population increased 0.8 percent, compared with 1.6 percent the same period in 2007. During the first half of last year, compared with the same period in 2007, 16 states reported smaller prison populations, and 18 others reported declines in growth rates.