Smart Supervision: Baltimore PD-CCD and Maryland DPP

The Second Chance Act, signed into law on April 9, 2008, provides a comprehensive response to the increasing number of people who are released from prison and jail and returning to communities, including resources to address the myriad needs of these offenders to achieve a successful return to their communities. As a complement to the Second Chance Act programs, the fiscal year (FY) 2017 Smart Supervision Program (SSP) seeks to improve probation and parole success rates and reduce the number of crimes committed by those under probation and parole supervision, which would in turn reduce admissions to prisons and jails and save taxpayer dollars. Funds can be used either to implement evidence-based supervision strategies or to innovate new strategies to improve outcomes for supervisees.

BJA’s “Smart Suite” of programs invest in the development of practitioner-researcher partnerships that use data, evidence, and innovation to create strategies and interventions that are effective and economical. This data-driven approach enables jurisdictions to understand the full nature and extent of the crime challenges they are facing and to target resources to the highest priorities. The Smart Suite of programs, which includes the Smart Supervision Program, represents a strategic approach that brings more “science” into criminal justice operations by leveraging innovative applications of analysis, technology, and evidence-based practices with the goal of improving performance and effectiveness while containing costs.

The goals of this program are to develop and test innovative strategies to implement evidence-based probation and parole approaches that improve supervision success rates, thereby increasing community safety, and reduce violent and other crime by effectively addressing individuals’ risk and needs and reducing recidivism.

The grantee will use awarded grant funds for Smart Supervision programming to reduce the recidivism rate for adult male offenders. Currently there are 700 Maryland Division of Parole and Probation agents supervising 42,000 offenders. The program will use evidenced based services and reentry practices to serve program eligible participants by providing case management recommendations based on risk and needs assessment tools, increase the use of Smart Supervision as a component of supervision; and reduce violent crimes and recidivism in a designated area by fifty percent over the next three years. Upon full implementation, the project will serve 225 clients annually.

CA/NCF