Protecting Inmates and Safeguarding Communities

The Protecting Inmates and Safeguarding Communities Discretionary Grant Program was created as a result of the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (the Act), Public Law 108-79. The goal of the Act is to eradicate sexual assaults in all of the correctional facilities in this country, be they federal, state, or local in nature. Nevertheless, the statutory focus for this grant program is state and local correctional facilities. This program is divided into two parts: (1) Protecting Inmates and (2) Safeguarding Communities. The Protecting Inmates part focuses on providing funding to state and local agencies for the costs of personnel, training, technical assistance, and data collection in the areas of prevention, investigation, prosecution, and treatment of victims of inmate on inmate sexual assault in a correctional facility. The Safeguarding Communities component of the program focuses on assisting the states in developing and implementing strategies when making release decisions for sexual aggressors without compromising public safety and addressing the needs of the victims after release.

The Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services (DPSCS) will use this funding to establish the foundation for overall improvements in the DPSCS' data collection, investigation, and preventive/deterrent capabilities to meet future Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) standards requirements. DPSCS will achieve this goal through the replacement of manual recordkeeping systems used for DPSCS investigations of sexual assault and misconduct (employee and inmate) with a unified management information system. Additionally, DCPS will obtain camera surveillance equipment for DPSCS institutional facilities, and 'personal duress alarms' (body alarms) for non-custodial personnel.

NCA/NCF