JRI Maximizing State Reforms Awards Announced for FY2017

The U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) has announced the recipients of this year’s Justice Reinvestment Initiative: Maximizing State Reforms awards. The JRI Maximizing award began in FY2014. Under the grant program, states may apply to receive up to $1,750,000 over a period of 36 months.

According to BJA, the purpose of the FY2017 Justice Reinvestment Initiative: Maximizing State Reforms Grant Program is to “cement or amplify the goals of states’ justice reinvestment reform efforts, deepening their investment in and commitment to use data-driven decision making and evidence-based practices and programs.”

Awardees may use the funds to:

• Promote the use of evidence-based, third-party programs and strategies;
• Enhance paroling authorities’ use of evidence-based policy, practice, and decision making;
• Create or expand the continuum of pretrial options;
• Develop and pilot measures and analyses that account for crime type, risk level, and criminal history;
• Establish or enhance performance incentive funding programs to encourage successful use of evidence-based practices in community supervision;
• Pilot or scale up swift and certain intermediate sanctions;
• Expand evidence-based reentry programs for people who are at a high risk of reoffending; or

Other uses that further the state’s justice reinvestment goals.

FY2017 JRI: Maximizing State Reforms Awards