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Why are Public Safety, Crime Prevention, and Victimization Important?
According to a survey conducted by the City of Austin, residents rate emergency police response, services for youth, and community policing as high priorities for city services (City of Austin, November 1999).
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A safe community is the highest priority of a citizenry.
Maslow, 1976
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While crime rates in Texas and nationally have been decreasing since 1995, incarceration rates have been increasing.1 With 150,000 prison beds, Texas leads the nation in prison construction (Mauer, 1999). Since 1982, the State has spent $2.7 billion on prisons, and spending in this area does not appear to be abating (Texas
Criminal Justice Policy Council, March 1999). Between 1998-1999 and 2000-2001, State biennial spending on prisons increased by about 23%, while overall State spending increased by only 16% (Center for Public Policy Priorities). Similarly, local spending on criminal justice/public safety expenses has also consistently increased. While Travis County spent approximately $60 million on criminal justice/public safety expenses in FY 1992, the County spent $110 million in FY 2000, a 55% increase (Travis County Fiscal Year 2000 Adopted Budget).
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"We're on a new higher plateau of crime, which means a new, higher and, I think, permanent prison population. It is very hard for a free society to figure out how effectively to deal with crime rates other than by imprisonment."
James Q. Wilson (Mauer, 1999)
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Table 1.
Estimated Cost of One Career Criminal to the American Public
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Description
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Cost
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Juvenile Career (4 years @ 1 - 4 crimes per year)
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Victim Costs
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$62,000 - $250,000
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Criminal Justice Costs
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$21,000 - $84,000
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Adult Career (6 years @ 10.6 crimes per year)
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Victim Costs
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$1,000,000
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Criminal Justice Costs
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$335,000
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Offender Productivity Loss
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$64,000
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Total Career
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Total Crime Cost
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$1.5 - $1.8 million
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Source: Snyder & Sickmund, September 1999 [from Mark Cohen's The monetary value of saving a high-risk youth, Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 14(1)].
In addition to the cost of building prisons, criminal behavior imposes other burdens on the community, including costs to victims and lost productivity caused by incarceration. A 1998 study by Mark Cohen estimated the cost an average career criminal imposes on society. Costs were based on estimates of the number and range of crimes the average career criminal commits, including tangible and intangible2 costs to victims, costs to the criminal justice system, and productivity losses caused by incarceration. Discounted to present-value dollars, the total costs imposed by a life of crime were estimated at $1.3 to $1.5 million3 (Snyder & Sickmund, September 1999). (See Table 1.) This type of analysis shows the value of investing early in high-risk youth.
Assessment Home
1. Incarceration rates have increased as a result of changes in law and policy that have increased the number of individuals entering prisons and increased sentence lengths.
2. Intangible costs included pain, suffering, and diminished quality of life of victims. Costs were quantified according to widely accepted techniques developed by economists for purposes of cost-benefit analyses.
3. The analysis included only those costs associated with adding a single individual to the pool of career criminals. No attempt was made to estimate a single criminal's share of aggregate crime costs (costs incurred because of the fear of crime, for example) which would have yielded a much higher figure.
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