By Travis Reginal, Jesse Jannetta, Sam Hoppe

This case study explores how Lake County, Illinois, and the City and County of San Francisco, with support from the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC)—an initiative funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to reduce overincarceration and disparities in jail populations—integrated equity into their efforts to reduce local jail populations. By examining the relationship between equity and decarceration, we provide actionable insights for jurisdictions aiming to address the root causes of incarceration disparities. The case study shows how these sites reevaluated and reshaped practices to tackle systemic inequities, offering a roadmap for reducing the overrepresentation of marginalized groups in the criminal legal system.

WHY THIS MATTERS

In the ongoing pursuit of criminal legal system reform, equity has emerged as a crucial lens for reshaping policies and practices. Systemic inequities—evidenced by racial and ethnic disparities in arrests, detention, and incarceration—remain pervasive. For example, Black people are jailed at nearly 3.5 times the rate of White people, and Native Americans at more than 2 times the rate. These disparities reflect both historical structural inequities, such as segregation, and unequal application of law enforcement practices.

With SJC support, jurisdictions have sought to reduce jail populations and eliminate racial inequities in them. While these decarceration efforts have reduced jail populations overall, many sites still struggle to address disparities, as reductions have often disproportionately benefited White people.

This case study underscores why prioritizing equity is essential for justice reform, offering actionable insights to help policymakers, practitioners, and advocates align decarceration goals with equity objectives. By addressing the root causes of disparities, jurisdictions can advance more effective, humane, and equitable approaches to justice.

WHAT WE FOUND

Drawing on stakeholders’ perceptions of their SJC efforts in Lake County and San Francisco, we highlight key lessons from their initiatives to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in local jails. These insights are intended to inform other jurisdictions as they navigate the challenges and opportunities of integrating equity into their justice reform strategies.

Lessons other jurisdictions might find informative for reducing racial and ethnic disparities in their jails include the following:

• Data play a pivotal role in efforts toward equity. Both sites demonstrated the importance of robust data analysis in identifying disparities and informing reforms. For instance, San Francisco used data to pinpoint drug-related offenses as a key driver of its jail population. However, data alone are insufficient—strategies to engage stakeholders who are not persuaded by data are also necessary.

• Institutionalizing equity work is a multilayered process. Sustaining progress requires embedding equity efforts into organizational structures. Both sites faced challenges owing to staff turnover and a lack of continuity plans, which slowed momentum. Creating dedicated equity-focused roles and ensuring succession planning are critical to maintaining long-term impact.

• Cross-system partnerships are needed to reduce disparities. Racial disparities are driven by inequities across systems like housing, education, and health care. Both sites highlighted the need for coordinated efforts across these sectors to address systemic barriers and promote equity effectively.

• Community engagement continues to be a challenging area for government. Both sites identified opportunities to improve how they engage with the community and raise awareness of their SJC work. Deciding when and how to involve the community meaningfully is critical for building trust and securing buy-in. It is equally important to provide supports and structures that enable community members—particularly those with lived experience—to participate effectively in partnerships with system actors and agencies. Additionally, balancing power dynamics between stakeholders requires careful planning, such as using a toolkit to manage relationships and foster equitable collaboration.

HOW WE DID IT

To develop this case study, we drew on three primary data sources: semistructured interviews with 17 stakeholders from Lake County and San Francisco (conducted between March 2023 and January 2024), analysis of SJC progress reports and public documents, and jail population trend data from the Institute for State and Local Governance. Interviewees represented a range of justice agencies and community partners, sharing insights on equity-focused reforms, challenges, and successes. We analyzed the interviews using NVivo qualitative software, applying a codebook developed to identify trends and themes related to local reform efforts and equity strategies.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2025. 45p.

By Chloe Anderson, Kyla Wasserman, Brit Henderson, with Erika Lewy

On January 1, 2017, the State of New Jersey implemented Criminal Justice Reform (CJR), a sweeping set of changes to its criminal legal system. With these reforms, the state shifted from a system that relied on money bail to a system that virtually eliminated the use of money bail and uses a risk-assessment tool that informs decision-making by generating scores based on an individual’s assessed risk of failing to appear at future court hearings and committing additional crimes if released. Additionally, CJR granted courts the option to detain people without bail until their cases are disposed, established a pretrial monitoring program, and instituted speedy-trial laws that impose time limits for case processing. The state’s goals were to improve fairness and reduce unnecessary pretrial detention while protecting public safety and ensuring that people continue to show up to their court hearings. While improving racial equity was not an explicit goal of the reforms, racial equity may be affected by reducing pretrial detention and eliminating the use of money bail. With support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Policies for Action Program, the New Jersey Criminal Justice Reform Advancing Racial Equity (NJ CARE) Study sought to assess racial equity and perceptions of fairness in New Jersey’s criminal legal system after the implementation of the reforms to determine whether the reforms improved racial equity in the state. Furthermore, the study explored whether individuals who were navigating the pretrial system as defendants perceived it as fair. Their experiences and the reforms’ effects on racial disparities reveal valuable lessons about the effects of bail reform efforts on racial equity. The study employed a mixed-methods approach that included quantitative and qualitative methods, as well as participatory elements. The quantitative analysis found that CJR had a net positive impact on some outcomes for both Black people and White people. More people were issued a summons (rather than a warrant) and were immediately released following arrest, and people were released from jail more quickly following an arrest. Yet despite these positive impacts, racial disparities persisted throughout the pretrial system, to varying degrees. For outcomes that had larger disparities before CJR, there was no meaningful reduction in disparities. The largest disparities are seen at the front end of the pretrial system, in arrest rates and initial jail bookings. For the qualitative analysis, interviewees—who had experience navigating the state’s pretrial system as defendants—said that CJR’s elimination of money bail has improved the fairness of the system. Yet they also said the criminal legal system should consider each person’s voice and circumstances, treat each person with respect, be transparent, assign the least restrictive release conditions when possible, and employ diverse staff members. Taken together, the findings suggest that broad bail reform policies can reduce the footprint of criminal legal system involvement, but they may not be a salve for issues of equity broadly and racial disparities specifically. There are several potential approaches to improve racial equity, including programs or processes that reduce people’s initial contact with the legal system, incorporate procedural justice-informed techniques into policing to improve police-community relationships, elevate the voices of individuals who have experience as defendants, enhance the criminal legal system’s transparency and communication, employ the least restrictive conditions of release and offer supportive services, engage prosecutors in reform efforts, and employ a more diverse staff. As a next step, these potential approaches should be rigorously studied.

In a completely equitable society, individuals would not be any more or less likely to experience burdens during their interactions with societal systems just because of their race. However, historically explicit and implicit practices and policies across the United States reinforce racial inequity, and these racial disparities are observed in many social systems, including the criminal legal system.1 Racial disparities in the pretrial system—that is, the period from the point of arrest to a case’s resolution in a verdict, plea deal, or dismissal— have broad equity implications. Spending time in jail—sometimes even just a few days—is associated with a variety of adverse effects on physical and mental health, as well as on social determinants of health like employment, housing, and family ties.2 Jurisdictions across the country have made efforts to reduce their use of pretrial detention and improve perceptions of the system’s fairness through different types of reforms—most notably by reducing their use of money bail or using actuarial risk-assessment tools to guide release decision-making.3 However, relatively little is known about the effects of these reforms.

New York: MDRC , 2024. 87p.

By: Carrie Pettus, Beth M. Huebner, Faye S. Taxman, Teisha Sanders, Laura Lightfoot, Nancy McCarthy, and Rebeccah Bennett

Jails hold more individuals than any other correctional facility, with over 10 million people admitted annually (Zeng & Minton, 2021). The management of jails at the local government level is characterized by inconsistent leadership and offering few services or transitional programming (Copp & Bales, 2018; Henrichson et al., 2015). The misuse of local jails is often noted because they have become mental health facilities, warehouse unconvicted pretrial populations, often for minor offenses, spread diseases such as COVID-19, and other related health concerns of overcrowding (Nowotny et al., 2020). Jails play a central role in the criminal legal system, and yet they are understudied and overused.

There is evidence of substantial racial disparities and other inequities in jail incarceration. Black people are disproportionately held in jail and, in 2019, had incarceration rates over three times that of white persons (Zeng & Minton, 2021). People of color are also less likely to be given non-monetary bail options and are substantially less likely to be able to post financial bonds, further contributing to disproportionate minority confinement (Wooldredge, 2012).

Jails are also racialized institutions. Many jails have racialized subcultures, where residents of non-white racial backgrounds face increased segregation, tensions, or violence; limited employment opportunities; and social stigma (Walker, 2022; Pettit & Gutierrez, 2018). Racial disparities in incarceration exacerbate vulnerability to violence, sexual abuse, solitary confinement, and inadequate healthcare (Western et al., 2021; Wildeman & Wang, 2017). Carceral environments such as jail often manifest racial divisions, with staff frequently exhibiting racial antagonisms, either individually or collectively.

Racism can also manifest within the dynamics of a jail setting, with documented instances of racial bias and discrimination within correctional facilities including, the rate at which Black individuals are admitted to jails and the corresponding length stay. Racial disparities among the staff also result from disparate hiring practices, barriers to promotions, and negative workplace interactions (Wooldredge, 2020). Discrimination among fellow staff can lead to a hostile work environment, exacerbating tensions and negatively impacting job satisfaction and morale, and a humane jail environment. But studies of jail officers’ experiences of racism are still limited.

Understanding and addressing these systemic issues are crucial for fostering a more equitable and just correctional system. New approaches are needed to transform the culture that contributes to racial bias in correctional settings. Yet, despite decades of studies documenting racial disparities as drivers of incarceration, few models have been implemented effectively to reduce inequities and disparities in the system.

This report presents an approach to addressing racial equity within jail settings. Our innovative method integrates participatory methods and evidence-driven quality improvement processes to develop and refine recommendations of racial equity interventions in complex jail systems. Participatory methods engage diverse stakeholders to assess historical and contemporary drivers of racism and develop cohesive organizational goals to promote racial equity. The Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) quality improvement process highlights the use of empirical information, allowing participants to address their perspectives and reconcile them with empirical data, resulting in the identification of new approaches that promote equity.

The premise of our work is that achieving racial equity in jails can profoundly impact the conditions of confinement for residents and working conditions for staff. For residents, outcomes include ensuring appropriate support, instilling a sense of fair treatment, improving the handling of individuals with health issues, and reducing the punitive nature of the jail climate. For staff, racially equitable policies and practices provide a better work environment, enhance well-being, aid recruitment and retention, support career advancements, and promote healthy exchanges with residents, as project outcomes.

In 2022, our collaborative initiative undertook a project to address racism and racial inequities within one County Jail.

KEY THEMES THAT EMERGED IN THE RESEARCH

• Resident workgroups described a lack of beneficial programs within the jail. Incarcerated women denoted that the programming was gendered, and that they did not have equal opportunity to participate in programming, like the education and training programs that had been recently launched for men.

• Healthcare, particularly mental health services, was a key stressor for all. Many residents indicated that their medical emergencies were not taken seriously or responded to in a timely manner. Female residents felt that the detox process was not well supported. Staff felt that they would like more mental health counseling made available, as well as more of an emphasis placed on improving the well-being of staff and incarcerated individuals, as a result of expressed powerlessness within their position as a staff member and status as an incarcerated resident.

• Inequities are also intersectional. For example, women felt that their hygiene needs were not addressed. Women lacked access to soap, menstrual supplies, and undergarments. Black women reported not having access to hair products that met their needs. Individuals who did not speak English as their primary language or had other physical or mental disabilities were perceived as not having their needs met or considered.

• Staff and incarcerated persons identified that they felt a pervasive sense of unfairness within the organization, and people in minority groups felt that there was little accountability for staff’s racist behavior or misconduct of any kind.

• Staff and incarcerated persons – the majority of whom are Black – felt that racism is implicitly endorsed and perpetuated. Conversely, some white staff and residents downplayed or overlooked the existence of racism, and attributed any hardships experienced in the jail environment to factors other than race.

• Staff-specific areas of concern included disparities in promotions and leadership opportunities. Black staff felt that they were often overlooked for promotions. Staff felt that there was a lack of transparency in the process, which led to perceptions of favoritism, particularly among the predominantly white male leaders.

• Through workgroups and surveys involving staff and residents, we identified and prioritized 30 intervention recommendations across three categories: Health and wellbeing, staff and resident interactions, and training and programs. These interventions, guided by an antiracism framework, aim to address power imbalances, disparities in perceptions of racism, and intersectional issues.

• Overall, it is essential to balance power distribution in racial equity work, particularly in the context of jails where conditions of confinement are intertwined with power dynamics. Participants recognized that jails are environments characterized by powerlessness, emphasizing the importance of addressing power imbalances as part of efforts to achieve racial equity.

• Increasing transparency and accountability emerged as a central theme for staff and residents. They felt there was a need to develop or appoint a neutral, external group to review the jail operations and manage staff complaints and internal affairs investigations. Residents also felt that developing an app that tracked the grievance process would be helpful.

• Staff requested a clear career pipeline from the jails’ frontline to leadership to allow for job expectations to be more transparent. They requested that all employees receive the support, training, and professional development opportunities needed to be promoted to higher jobs.

• Both staff and residents requested substantial reforms to their respective healthcare needs. Residents suggested implementing a protocol to respond to sick calls and medical emergencies. Residents also requested healthier food and access to more recreation time. Staff felt that there was a stigma against requesting assistance, particularly mental health care, and suggested more confidential programming and supports.

Moving forward, ongoing implementation, evaluation, and refinement of interventions remain crucial to validate this process and the issues that were exposed. Staff and residents raised concerns about the full adoption and sustainability of the effort and interventions. The issues raised require care and attention by jail leadership that are often not fully available to those who manage a chaotic environment. There is a need for continued support in the implementation of the recommendations from the PDSA process. This underscores the broader implications for the sustainability of this transformative work and its potential for lasting systemic change.

Fairfax County, VA: Safety & Justice Challenge, George Mason University, 42p.