RE: Eau Claire County Local Justice System Assessment - Full Study.

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Nowlan, Robert A. (RANOWLAN@uwec.edu)
Sat, 1 Mar 2008 12:24:24 -0600



From: "Nowlan, Robert A." <RANOWLAN@uwec.edu>
Date: Sat, 1 Mar 2008 12:24:24 -0600
Subject: RE: Eau Claire County Local Justice System Assessment  - Full Study.
Message-ID: <7A17A445D0203848B157E8D70D1AC77E46158C8F7C@CHERRYPEPSI.uwec.edu>

I too want to thank Dan for his excellent and necessary redirection/reframi ng of this discussion. So much has been researched and written with great credibility for so long now with the myriad problems in jailing and impriso ning within the United States (how extraordinaly excessive, unjust, and cou nter-productive so much of it is), including even within the mainstream big
 corporate media, that it is definitely worth investigating to what extent alternatives to jail (and prison) sentencing are being pursued in Eau Clair e (and many exist). I'm glad to see many are starting to focus on that her e; sadly I cannot promise to do anything myself to help in the immediate or
 short-term as I am in a position now where I am totally, massively overwhe lmed with existing commitments and responsibilities which I desperately nee d to reduce significantly and soon.

Bob Nowlan

-----Original Message----- From: sfpj-request@listserve.uwec.edu [mailto: [mailto:sfpj-request@listserve.uwec.e du] On Behalf Of Kaldjian, Paul J. Sent: Saturday, March 01, 2008 12:01 PM To: Drumm, Daniel L.; sfpj@listserve.uwec.edu Cc: 'mw2085@charter.net'; 'Ken@Fulgione.net'; De Grave, Jeff R. Subject: RE: Eau Claire County Local Justice System Assessment - Full Study
.

This is great, Dan, thank you. Actually, it is unbelievable. The immediat e concern with the jail facilities and the county's overreach in trying to steal the river front resource may be just the thing to bring the public in to a discussion of more fundamental and systemic issues. In our current di scussions, the generally accepted premise has been that the need for increa sed capacity is obvious. But this is not so clear, according to the US Dep t of Justice report you have provided.

This report is brand, brand new. If I read it correctly, the consultants w ere in town on 19th February 2008 to conduct assessments of jail capacity a nd occupancy (page 14). It is inconceivable to me how the county can be tr ying to understand the problem at the very same time that they are confiden tly stating that $59.1 million will fix the problem. Am I missing somethin g?

Below, I have pasted a excerpts from my quick reading. These are not inten ded to take statements out of context, but to provide evidence that jail in adequacey, the apparent driver for the current expansion, is not how discus sions should proceed. In fact, the more I go over the report, the more it
 seems that specific plans for a jail and its expansion are premature. Unt il the system wide and policy problems are understood and addressed, buildi ng a new jail will -- as county supervisors even alluded to on 19 February
-- bring us back to where we are now.

According to the report,

"Eau Claire is safe and its people are pretty well behaved (page 18)."

"The jail is used to house a wide range of inmate types. It is attempting t o

do too much. Almost anyone can be admitted. A very wide variety of

federal, immigration, out of state, state, and local inmates reside there. It is

a mixture of three distinct groups: "people we are afraid of, people we are

upset with and people we do not know what to do with (page 19)."

"More clearly defining the purpose of the jail is a first step in managing the

flow into the jail and the length of stay. This will help define the number

and composition of the jail population. Until and unless this is done, the

jail will remain crowded (page 19)."

"The predominant view, the predominant strategy for coping with the

growing workload has been to seek additional resources, add jail beds,

and add program capacity. This represents a near singular strategy aimed

at trying to outrun growth by adding capacity. But the system is up

against substantial resource limits and the strategy is coming under

increased scrutiny because, to some, it does not seem to be working (page 2 0)."

and

"A first conceptual trap has been the view that jail crowding is "the

problem." A related notion is the view that jail crowding is "the Sheriff's

problem". It turns out that jail crowding really just a symptom. It is a

symptom of problems within the larger justice system. Success requires a

system-wide approach. One must literally go outside the perceived

"problem" in order to solve it (page 20/21)"

Some of thepeople who were interviewed seem to believe that a new jail will
 "solve

the problem". In fact, a new jail, by itself, may not change very much. New

bed space may be filled quickly. It is also possible that the new emerging

programs will expand the total number of people under correctional

supervision, also fill to capacity, and have very little impact on the numb er

of people in jail (page 24)."

"Recommendations include increased public participation and better analysis
 of existing data to provide information on the jail population, its charac teristics and needs, put into a proper form, analyzed and routinely reporte d out. . . . Understanding these population dynamics is essential to unders tanding why the number of people in jail is increasing (or falling) (page 2 9)."

P. Kaldjian Geography & Anthropology University of Wisconsin -- Eau Claire
________________________________ From: sfpj-request@listserve.uwec.edu [sfpj-request@listserve.uwec.edu] On Behalf Of Drumm, Daniel L. [DRUMM@uwec.edu] Sent: Friday, February 29, 2008 5:25 PM To: sfpj@listserve.uwec.edu Cc: 'mw2085@charter.net'; 'Ken@Fulgione.net' Subject: Eau Claire County Local Justice System Assessment - Full Study.

Hot off the Press:

Eau Claire County Local Justice System Assessment

US Department of Justice National Institute of Corrections Jail Division NIC TA-08J1010

Here is the study as promised. You can read these even before most members
 of the County Board. I have not read it yet, but from the index, there loo ks to be a lot of leverage within. Happy reading.

Study: http://tyronecoal.com/NIC2008.pdf

Appendix: http://tyronecoal.com/NICAppendix2008.pdf

Dan Drumm



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