Vince Schiraldi, executive director of the Washington-based Justice Policy Institute, has an excellent op-ed in today's Washington Post about the decline of the lock 'em up and throw away the key mentality that politicians have foisted on us the past few decades.

We've written about this several times, here and here for example, providing the usual explanation--states are facing unprecedented budget crunches. But, Vince writes, there's another (more heartening) factor at play here as well:

So history suggests that dollars have never been the single motivating factor in prison policies. Rather, some policymakers are stepping back to evaluate corrections systems, finding that there is a better way to achieve public safety that is supported by opinion leaders and public opinion alike.

In state after state, research has called into question the effectiveness of imprisonment and supported the use of treatment and other alternatives to incarceration -- and policymakers have taken notice. After the Washington State Institute for Public Policy found that certain treatment options reduced rearrests and yielded better public safety outcomes than prison, officials there enacted legislation diverting offenders from prison into treatment. The reforms saved the state $50 million over two years, $8 million of which was spent to expand treatment options. Joe Lehman, Washington state's corrections secretary, stated, "It's not just about money, it's about informing our sentencing policies with what we know from research works in mitigating the risk of offenders and enhancing community safety."

[link via How Appealing.]