For courts with limited resources that are interested in problem-solving, Buffalo (N.Y.) City Court offers an intriguing model. With no extra funds, in 1995 the court began to identify defendants’ social problems and link them to needed services. Today, Buffalo’s innovative C.O.U.R.T.S. (Court Outreach Unit: Referral and Treatment Services) program links together more than 130 community-based providers and makes more than 6,000 referrals a year.

 

The program, a collaborative effort of Buffalo City Court and the City of Buffalo, provides judges with an on-site court-based screening and referral service. “We’re basically a treatment and communication broker for the court. And you name it, we got it. We basically can meet any need of a person who comes through the doors,” Director Hank Pirowski says. The program links individuals coming through the justice system with a full range of social services, including drug treatment, mental health treatment, medical care, anger management, family counseling, youth counseling, domestic violence and battering programming, vocational/educational services, and housing.

The idea for the program came about in 1994, when the Hon. Thomas Amodeo became chief judge for the Buffalo City Court. Frustrated by the haphazard way defendants were being placed into treatment, the lack of a centralized tracking system for the court, and increased recidivism rates driven in part by the crack epidemic, he started talking to court staff and city officials about new ways of doing business. According to Amodeo, the court had two major problems: first, reports weren’t coming back to the judge, and second, the court needed a regimented screening system to ensure that everyone who needed treatment received it.

Treatment provider Hank Pirowski spearheaded a study of how the court could best link clients to services. “That’s when we came up with this idea, to get all our partnering agencies involved,” Pirowski says. The court then called together a meeting with over 60 area providers to get them on board, explaining the concept for the program and convincing providers that if they would co-locate staff members in space provided by the court, defendants would have easier access to their treatment systems. “On the staffing side we started the program with no dollars,” Pirowski says. “Zero. I was given a closet in the courthouse that still had wash basins in it. But the city gave me a team of six people, two from the Division of Substance Abuse Services and four from the Division for Youth, and my partnering agencies donated staff at no additional cost to the court.”

Today there are 26 full- and part-time workers on site, only four of them from the Office of Court Administration. “Without the community partnership, we wouldn’t exist,” says Pirowski, who also helps oversee Buffalo’s drug court and mental health court.

C.O.U.R.T.S. staff interview defendants while in custody, relaying the information to court advocates, who make recommendations to judges. The judges make the final call on whether a defendant is appropriate for C.O.U.R.T.S. or not. Defendants referred to the program are placed with a participating member of the treatment consortium. Placement is based not on which agency performed the assessment but on the defendant’s individual needs, geographical location and ability to pay. No one is allowed to refer defendants to his or her own agency, though the judge may approve such a placement if it is clearly the best choice for the defendant. Managed care partners are on site to make the process run more smoothly. And once defendants are placed, case managers monitor defendants’ compliance with tailored, individual service plans, and report treatment outcomes to the judge.

By the summer of 2006 the C.O.UR.T.S. program had made over 40,000 referrals, and was referring 6,000 cases to social service providers each year. From 2000 to 2005, defendants completed over 75,500 hours of community service, including graffiti removal and demolition of crack houses. The value of labor contributed to the community during that time was estimated to be $453,000. The program has received the New York State Bar Association Public Service Award for the Furtherance of Justice and the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ City Livability Award.

Over the past several years, a broad consensus has emerged within the research community that adult drug courts indeed fulfill their promise of increased treatment retention rates and reduced recidivism. While it is difficult to generate exact national estimates, drug courts appear to retain from 60 to 65 percent of their participants for at least one year. This improves considerably on the 10 to 30 percent one-year retention rates that are typical of community-based treatment programs nationwide, where many participants enter voluntarily—without the pressure of a court mandate. Further, drug courts appear to average about a 15 percentage point reduction in the re-arrest rate when compared with conventional prosecution (although many drug courts have achieved considerably larger reductions). While most studies only track re-arrests over one or two years following program intake, several that track offenders over longer “post-program” periods—including studies of the Los Angeles Treatment Court, Baltimore City Treatment Court, and six New York State drug courts—have similarly found that drug courts reduce recidivism.

 

Drug court results vary considerably from site to site of course. As with many innovations showing early promise, results may decline as drug courts are institutionalized, early charismatic judges and other staff turn over, and funding resources grow more strained. Sustaining the model’s effectiveness may require a more surgical approach to research, focused less on “The bottom line”—do drug courts work?—and more on teasing out which specific components are truly essential. While to date research efforts in this area are limited, a few lessons have begun to emerge:

• Immediacy: Participants engaged early in the drug court process, often measured by whether they actually begin attending a community-based treatment program within the first thirty days after formally agreeing to enter a drug court, are more likely to be retained and have successful long-term outcomes.
• Legal Coercion: Part of the success of drug courts stems from the threat of jail for failure. However, legal coercion does not work magically on its own. Evidence indicates that drug courts elicit greater perceptions of coercion when staff conveys clearly, frequently, and specifically the exact consequences of graduating and failing (how much jail time will be served); and when participants perceive that noncompliance will be consistently and swiftly detected and enforced.
• Judicial Supervision: Biweekly judicial supervision before the drug court judge works especially well with “high-risk” participants (e.g., with those who have previous failed treatment or are diagnosed with anti-social personality disorder). Supervision that includes a great deal of positive feedback from the judge is particularly effective.
• Sanctions: Behavioral research is clear that sanctions are effective when applied consistently (in every case), fairly (everyone treated the same), rapidly (soon after the infraction), and with appropriate severity (severe enough to be undesirable but not so severe as to preclude graduating to a more severe sanction next time). The literature is limited with respect to which drug court sanctions are most effective, and under what circumstances, however.
• Rewards: The limited research that exists suggests that rewards appear to increase program retention when they are tangible and applied frequently throughout the participation process—not merely once every three or four months upon phase advancement.
• Treatment: In general, more time in treatment leads to more positive post-treatment outcomes on measures such as drug use, criminal activity, and employment. Ninety days in treatment is a critical minimum threshold, while on the other end of the spectrum, imposing excessive graduation requirements that keep participants in treatment far beyond one year may be counter-productive. While the evidence indicates that treatment can make a difference, little is known about which modalities (e.g., residential, outpatient, etc.) are most appropriate for different categories of participants.
• Graduation: Participants who reach drug court graduation are more likely to attain continued success thereafter. Can those who fail drug court nonetheless gain from the experience? Several studies suggest they cannot—that graduation is a pivotal milestone and that without it continued progress is unlikely. These findings highlight the importance for drug courts to maximize their graduation rate (again suggesting that graduation requirements should not be excessive).

Equally important as how drug courts work is for whom—which categories of defendants are especially likely to benefit. While little is known to date, three categories of defendants have emerged as likely candidates for success: (a) “high risk” defendant (e.g., more serious criminal history and weaker community ties), (b) those facing greater legal consequences for failing (e.g., those charged with more serious offenses and thus facing more potential jail time), and (c) drug offenders (i.e., as opposed to those arrested for property or other crimes, who may be driven by criminal impulses or motivations besides addiction).

 

During spring and summer 2004, focus groups were conducted among the participants and court staff in three New York State drug courts. The research was designed to provide feedback about drug court operations and to assist programs by examining the extent to which participants and staff hold comparable views about various aspects of the drug court experience. In other words, do drug court participants and court staff see eye-to-eye?

At each court, participant sessions were followed by focus groups and interviews among court staff. Participants and staff discussed a variety of topics: why participants enter and remain in drug court, views about the drug court program and staff, which components of be the program are more and less effective, the courtroom experience, and suggestions to improve the program.

Motivating the project was a recognition that drug courts are likely to be most effective when those operating programs are fully cognizant of the attitudes and experiences of program participants. Drug court staff and participants will, of course, have areas of agreement and disagreement. But it is crucial for staff to be aware of how their perceptions and attitudes might differ from participants’ so that they can most effectively manage those differences, deliver the drug court intervention, and identify areas for continuous improvement.

To ensure the anonymity of research participants, the drug courts are not individually identified in the report, which can be read in its entirety here. The report focuses on common themes and findings that emerged across sites.

Key Findings
Drug court participants and court staff generally do see eye-to-eye. In all three courts, staff were remarkably cognizant about why participants enter drug court, what they do and do not like about it, and what motivates them to remain clean and in the program. The research also made clear that these courts, to varying degrees, regularly elicit feedback from program participants and take that feedback into account when shaping policies and procedures. Staff members’ knowledge of and concern for the participant perspective likely explains in part participants’ positive impressions of the staff.

More detailed findings are below.
 

• Participants enter drug court primarily to avoid prison, not to enter treatment and get off drugs. Although some said that their opportunity to enter drug court happened at the “right time” when they wanted to enter treatment, the overwhelming majority of participants acknowledged that they entered drug court mainly to avoid going to prison. Most also felt that, although the program is nominally voluntary, they had little choice but to enter drug court—prison is viewed as an unattractive alternative. Many participants did concede that their motivation changed after being in the program for some time, and they became more concerned about completing treatment, staying clean, and improving their lives.
• Many participants do not fully appreciate what they are agreeing to when they enter drug court. Most drug court participants reported that the rules and expectations of drug court were explained to them, but it was not until they spent some time in the program and began treatment that they fully understood what they had gotten into—intensive supervision and monitoring. Drug court staff members were aware of this, and reported that they make numerous attempts to make it clear to participants what they are agreeing to at program entry. They were also aware that participants are likely to be resistant early on and that it takes time for them to adjust to the program.
• Most participants believe the rules of drug court are fair. Most participants reported that the rules of drug court are fair and felt that they are treated fairly by the treatment court team. They spoke particularly favorably about how the judge and others take participants’ “personal situations” into account when making decisions such as sanctions and phase advancement. This knowledge about participants’ lives, and capacity to use it to craft personalized responses, appears to add to drug court participants’ perceptions of procedural justice.
• Defense attorneys were not perceived as important to drug court. Many participants complained about what they felt was their defense attorneys’ lack of involvement in their case. Once again, staff members appeared aware of these concerns. Some seemed to agree that, at least after the participant enters drug court, defense attorneys are not critical to the program. Others, however, pointed out that defense attorneys have a role but that it is largely behind the scenes—in team meetings rather than open court. Drug court participants, therefore, generally do not see the work their counsel does for them, according to this argument.
• The judge is a critical component of the drug court treatment model. Both participants and staff had largely positive views about the judge in their court. While appearing before the judge can be daunting, particularly for those called up on an infraction, most participants acknowledged that the judge was fair, sympathetic, and supportive, and that having to appear before the judge helped them stick to their treatment plan.
• Heightened monitoring, drug testing, and the threat of prison are key motivators to remain clean and in the program. The threat of going to prison for failing the drug court program has a clear and powerful effect on virtually all drug court participants. Participants clearly feared incarceration and would go to great lengths to avoid it. Just as most participants entered drug court to avoid prison, so too the prospect of incarceration is a powerful motivator to keep them in the program.
• Participants also cited heightened monitoring, especially frequent drug testing, as a critical component of drug court. They differentiated drug court from previous court experiences where there was little monitoring and, thus, their continued drug use went undiscovered.
• The courtroom experience is critical to drug court participants. Drug court participants clearly personalized the experience of appearing before and speaking to the judge in court; it appears to have a powerful effect. Participants spoke about being very nervous before court appearances, particularly when they anticipated sanction or reprimand and also about the sense of satisfaction when they received positive feedback from the judge. Sitting in court and seeing other cases also appears to be effective. Participants were surprisingly cognizant that this “audience effect” is intentional and most agreed that seeing others receive praise and sanctions (particularly the latter) sends the message that “it could be me” and helps to keep them clean.
• Treatment programs were the subject of frequent complaint. In all focus groups, criticism focused on a variety of complaints about treatment programs. Participants voiced concern about the length of treatment, classes they felt were inappropriate for them, scheduling issues, and required treatment fees. Staff discussed the lack of certified treatment providers in their communities, particularly those offering programs for specialized populations, as well as the drug court’s limited ability to hold providers accountable.

Suggestions to Improve Drug Courts
The focus groups also produced a number of thoughtful suggestions from participants and staff about ways to improve their drug court programs. Participants recommended expanding the court in different ways—e.g., having more treatment providers work with the court and providing flexible scheduling of classes; enhancing access to education, employment, job training, and other services; and reimbursing for travel so participants can more easily travel between court and treatment and home. Drug court staff echoed many of these concerns, and offered other suggestions not raised by participants, including the need for more treatment services for women, non-English speakers and the dually diagnosed; more training in addiction issues for judges, attorneys, and other legal staff who work with drug courts (as well as those in other court settings); and more widely available methadone treatment.

Should problem solving be encouraged in general courts? Some may object that elements of the problem solving court model are inconsistent with conventional court processes. There are also unresolved questions. What this research project makes clear, however, is that the potential exists for problem solving to be practiced both in specialized and conventional court settings.

In recent years, an array of innovative courts has emerged throughout the country in an effort to address the underlying problems of defendants, victims and communities. Adult drug courts, which seek to break the cycle of addiction, crime, and repeat incarceration by mandating addicted defendants to treatment, were the first such innovation. The first drug court opened in Dade County, Florida in 1989; since then, more than a thousand others have opened. Analogous models have also arisen, including family and juvenile drug courts, domestic violence courts, community courts, and mental health courts. These “problem-solving” courts all attempt to use the authority of the judiciary in new ways and are characterized by a number of unique elements: a problem-solving focus; team approach to decision-making; referrals to treatment and other social services; ongoing judicial monitoring; direct interaction between litigants and judge; community outreach; and a proactive role for the judge inside and outside of the courtroom.

As the first generation of drug courts has been proven effective and received public attention and support, several states have begun efforts to institutionalize—or take to scale—problem-solving innovation throughout their court systems. For example, under the leadership of Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye, New York State has implemented adult drug courts in every New York county and has plans for implementing an “integrated” criminal/family domestic violence court in all counties by 2007.

In addition to replicating problem-solving courts, a growing number of policymakers have expressed an interest in the application of problem-solving court practices outside the specialized court setting. Among those interested are the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators, who advocated,

where appropriate, the broad integration over the next decade of the principles and methods of problem solving courts into the administration of justice to improve court processes and outcomes while preserving the rule of law, and meeting the needs and expectations of litigants, victims, and the community.

In an effort to aid this process, the California Administrative Office of the Courts, in collaboration with the Center for Court Innovation in New York, recently conducted research to explore how court systems might integrate problem-solving court practices into conventional court operations. Focus groups were conducted with problem-solving court judges in California and New York, two states at the forefront of testing new problem-solving models. The discussions were wide-ranging but focused on which problem-solving court practices are most easily applied in conventional courts, barriers to the more widespread adoption of problem solving, and strategies to overcome these barriers. The participating judges were cautiously optimistic, identifying many opportunities to practice problem solving in mainstream courts, while raising numerous barriers as well.

Which Problem Solving Practices Can Be Integrated throughout Conventional Courts?
Focus group participants identified a number of practices they felt could be effectively applied in conventional courts, including:

• Problem-Solving Orientation. Participants felt that judges in a variety of criminal and civil court settings could be more proactive—asking more questions, reaching out to service providers, and generally seeking more information about each case. Using that information, they could craft more individualized and at times unconventional court orders.
• Interaction with Defendants/Litigants. Focus group participants considered direct engagement with defendants to be one of the easiest practices to apply in conventional courts, perhaps because it requires no additional resources. Concerns were raised that, in criminal cases, defense attorneys might prevent such interaction for fear that clients might incriminate themselves. But several judges reported that they routinely address defendants directly, with few objections from the defense bar.
• Treatment and Social Service Integration. Participants identified opportunities to integrate social service mandates (drug treatment, job training, anger management, etc.) into more areas of the conventional court process. At the same time, there was a recognition of the need for increased access to, and coordination of, services.
• Judicial Supervision. Requiring defendants to report back to court to discuss progress with court mandates was identified by participants as one of the most effective practices that could be applied in conventional criminal courts. While acknowledging the limited time available, many judges said that they have integrated ongoing supervision into their conventional court practice.
• Team-Based, Non-Adversarial Approach. There was less agreement about whether it is feasible or appropriate to lessen the adversarial nature of the conventional court process. But many judges felt that there were opportunities to craft resolutions agreeable to all parties, particularly in juvenile and family law settings, which already foster such an approach. Participants cautioned that a non-adversarial approach cannot be imposed by the judge alone but is contingent on the willingness of attorneys. They emphasized that defense attorneys in particular must come to trust that the judge will not allow such a team approach to compromise the defendant’s interests.

What Are the Barriers and How Might They Be Overcome?
Focus group participants identified two key categories of impediments to the practice of problem solving in conventional courts. The first and most significant is limited time and resources. Judges, particularly those in higher-volume jurisdictions, emphasized that they had little time for individualized attention to cases and for ongoing supervision, citing pressures to “move cases along.” Participants also noted that conventional courts lack the technology, case management staff, and other resources that help make specialized problem-solving courts effective.

Could these resource-related barriers be overcome? Some participants were pessimistic, but several strategies did emerge from the discussion. For example, judges might adopt a “triage” approach, selecting only the most appropriate cases for increased attention and ongoing judicial supervision. Also discussed were longer-term, more systemic (and costly) solutions such as establishing court-wide screening, assessment and case management systems, sharing specialized problem-solving courts’ case management resources with other courts, and developing directories of community-based service providers to inform all judges about available programs.

The second key barrier is conflicting philosophies. Many focus group participants felt that judges with a “traditional” role orientation (“deciding cases,” not “solving problems”) are unlikely to embrace problem solving. Others disagreed, arguing that problem solving is a “learned behavior” and that “exposure to the concept” is the key to changing attitudes. For this reason, many judges believed that educational efforts would be most effective with newer judges, who are less set in their philosophy and practices and more open to learning new skills. The judges conceded, however, that attitudes among longer tenured judges may be slow to change and, therefore, the widespread adoption of problem solving would inevitably be a long-term process. Participants also felt that there are many judges who would potentially be receptive to problem solving yet lack the necessary skills or are unaware of opportunities to practice it in conventional courts.

Steps were suggested to better educate the bench, such as including relevant training courses in new judge orientation and judicial college curricula. Most judges felt that it would only make a difference if these courses were mandatory to avoid a “preaching to the choir” effect. Also recommended were less formal ways that judges could be exposed to problem solving—observing specialized problem-solving courts, holding brown bag lunches to discuss relevant issues, sharing success stories. A common theme was that judges should “hear it from other judges” rather than from administrators, attorneys or academics. Focus group participants also encouraged similar training for prosecutors and defenders.

In California, there was discussion of the need for “encouragement” and “institutional validation” from presiding judges and other judicial leaders. They suggested that these leaders might encourage bench judges to practice problem solving when appropriate and to volunteer for specialized problem-solving court assignments. Focus group participants did not, however, favor mandatory assignment to these courts, fearing that an assigned judge might be hostile to the court’s goals or methods, or that too-frequent rotation might introduce discontinuity and reduce efficiency. One participant suggested that when making promotions that judicial leaders place less emphasis on traditional skills (e.g., scholarly publications or timely case flow management) and greater emphasis on solving problems.

Conclusion
Should problem solving be encouraged in general courts? Some may object that elements of the problem solving court model are inconsistent with conventional court processes. There are also unresolved questions. We do not yet know how effective problem solving might be when practiced in conventional courts, with their heavier caseloads, more adversarial process and untrained court personnel. Nor do we know what might be lost when judges and courts, rather than adopting the entire problem-solving court model, selectively apply just some of its practices and principles. What this research project makes clear, however, is that the potential exists for problem solving to be practiced both in specialized and conventional court settings.

Launched in January 2004, the Youth Justice Board brings together young people from throughout New York City to propose solutions to the public safety issues that affect them and their peers. Shocked to learn that 75% of all youth released from state custody are rearrested within three years, the sixteen Board members—drawn from high schools throughout the city—spent nine months researching the topic of juvenile reentry. They met with over two dozen city and state officials, youth workers, scholars, and even reentry youth and their family members, then spent months analyzing the data they collected, formulating policy recommendations and drafting a formal report.

Based on their interviews and research, the Youth Justice Board identified three principles that should apply to the whole reentry process:

• Early Planning
  Most juveniles who enter placement return to the same communities that they left. Placement is an opportunity to prepare the young person—and the family—to address the challenges he or she will face when released. Therefore, planning for the return home should start early—as soon as the decision is made to send the young person to placement.
• Individual Treatment
  The Youth Justice Board recommends that the key players involved with each young person meet early to create a plan that reflects his or her individual strengths and challenges. The team should include the young person, guardians, staff from the state agency responsible for placement and reentry (New York State Office of Children and Family Services, or OCFS), and a school representative.
• Coordination
  Young people in placement and aftercare come into contact with many agencies (e.g. OCFS, the New York City Department of Education, and community-based service providers), but the Board heard from several agencies that they are in the dark about what other agencies were doing. Regular meetings of all the agencies working with reentry youth would help improve communication, ensuring that youth do not fall between the cracks.

Building on these principles, the Youth Justice Board recommends the following ideas to help prevent recidivism among reentry youth:

1. Motivate young people to succeed
Ultimately, reentry youth themselves are the only ones that can improve their lives. One of the reasons youth drop out of programs and get into trouble is that they are not involved in activities they enjoy. To help reentry youth stay motivated, the Board recommends linking youth to programs they can get excited about, offering job training and links to adult mentors, in particular.

2. Help young people get in school and stay in school
Although everyone interviewed agreed that education is crucial, it is hard to get reentry youth back in school and it is hard to get them to stay in school. One Department of Education official said that the biggest barrier is “the human hurdle—no one wants them back.” The Board recommends that OCFS make a higher priority of helping young people catch up in basic reading and math skills while in placement and provide an orientation workshop once they return home to prepare students for the return to their local school. In addition, the Department of Education should match students to schools quickly, make sure credits earned in placement are transferred correctly, and create incentives for schools to accept reentry students.

3. Strengthen the relationships between family and youth
One OCFS official said that if a young person is not accepted by his or her family, he or she will hang out in the streets. He emphasized that it was important to make sure that the family is ready for the young person’s return and bring the youngster up to speed on what has occurred back home. To help address these problems, the Board recommends counseling for the family and youth together, as well as voluntary parent-to-parent support groups. In addition, to maintain communication while the young person is in custody, OCFS should make sure families have an easy way to visit placement facilities in upstate New York.

4. Improve the reentry process
The Board recommends four specific ways to improve the current reentry process:

• Share assessment information. OCFS collects a lot of information about the young person. Relevant information from these assessments should be available to the organizations that provide services to the young person.
• Track the early warning signs of recidivism. Usually there are warning signs before a young person is rearrested: he or she becomes truant, violates curfew or doesn’t attend programs. OCFS should institute a uniform system to track these warning signs and intervene before the next arrest occurs.
• Create Connection Centers. The Board recommends creating a transition facility just north of New York City that would focus on helping young people make the difficult transition from placement to home. Since it is closer to home, OCFS aftercare workers, Department of Education staff, and parents could all meet to make sure the details of the reentry plan (e.g. school placement) are in place.
• Create Welcome Centers. Once they are back home, reentry youth need a place where they can go to get reliable information about services and opportunities. Welcome Centers in their communities would have links to youth development programs, mental health and substance abuse services, job training and peer support groups.

 

Nationally, there are 27 community courts in operation across the United States. The first community court opened in midtown Manhattan in 1993. Focusing on quality-of-life offenses (drug possession, shoplifting, vandalism, prostitution, and the like), the Midtown Community Court combined punishment and help, sentencing low-level offenders to perform visible community restitution and receive on-site social services, including drug treatment, counseling, and job training. The community courts that have followed in the Midtown Court’s wake seek to achieve many goals, such as reduced crime, increased engagement between citizens and the courts, improved perceptions of neighborhood safety, and a greater level of accountability for low-level, "quality-of-life" offenders.

 

 

 

As yet, no consensus has emerged regarding how to best measure the goals of these programs, primarily due to the large variety of models adopted by different courts. To date, there are seven notable community court evaluations focusing on four community courts—Midtown Community Court, Red Hook Community Justice Center in Brooklyn, New York, Hennepin County Community Court in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Hartford Community Court in Connecticut. This article summarizes the basic findings from these evaluations.

While sharing similar goals overall, the four community courts studied have a variety of differences, both in the types of court cases they hear and in their programmatic emphasis. It comes as little surprise that a variety of methodologies have been used to evaluate community courts. The most common is some form of community survey (e.g, phone interviews, door-to- door surveys, focus groups) designed to measure community perceptions of community court success. This was the primary method of the two Red Hook studies (Moore 2004; Frazer 2005). In addition, the studies of Hennepin (Weidner and Davis 2000; Eckberg 2001), Midtown (Sviridoff et al—Phase One, 2000; Phase Two, 2001), and Hartford (The Justice Education Center 2002) included offender interviews or focus groups and utilized stakeholder interviews to gather the perceptions and opinions of court staff and treatment providers. The two Hennepin studies and both Midtown studies also gathered administrative/court data to do larger-scale quantitative analysis. As a result, Midtown and Hennepin, unlike Hartford, have been a subject of both process and outcome evaluations. The 2000 Hennepin and Midtown studies included cost-benefit analyses as well.

What follows is a review of what the literature tells us with regard to the community courts’ success in meeting their primary goals—holding offenders to a greater level of accountability for quality-of-life crimes, increasing communication between the community and the criminal justice system, improving community perceptions of safety, increasing case processing efficiency, and reducing certain types of crimes in certain neighborhoods.

Holding Offenders Accountable
One of the original goals of the Midtown Community Court was to reduce the number of “walks” given out for quality-of-life crimes—sentences such as “time served” or a conditional discharge with no conditions. Midtown achieved this goal for all of the most common charges handled by the court—between 1 percent and 12 percent of Midtown offenders were given a “walk” for the top four charges compared to 23 percent to 55 percent of offenders whose cases were heard at Manhattan’s centralized criminal court. As such, offenders sentenced at the Midtown Community Court were at least twice as likely to receive a community or social service sentence as opposed to offenders sentenced in downtown Manhattan.

In addition to changing sentencing practice, the Midtown Court also sought to improve compliance with community-based sanctions. Researchers found that the Midtown community service compliance rate was 75 percent—about 50 percent higher than downtown, and the highest compliance rate in all of New York City.

Finally, the 2000 community survey in Hennepin reported that community members thought the most important feature of the community court was that compliance with community service sentences was closely monitored by the court (3.73 on a scale of 4.0).

Community Perceptions
Many community members in Midtown and Hennepin reported that they were willing to reallocate their tax dollars, or even pay more in taxes, to support a community court. In Midtown, 64 percent of respondents were willing to pay some amount of additional taxes to support a court with features like the Midtown Community Court. Of those willing to pay more in taxes, 52 percent were willing to pay up to $100 extra per year.

Many community members in Midtown and Hennepin reported that they were willing to reallocate their tax dollars, or even pay more in taxes, to support a community court. In Midtown, 64 percent of respondents were willing to pay some amount of additional taxes to support a court with features like the Midtown Community Court. Of those willing to pay more in taxes, 52 percent were willing to pay up to $100 extra per year.

In the 2000 Hennepin study, 66 percent of community residents who were surveyed were willing to reallocate their taxes, and 64 percent were willing to pay more in taxes to support a community court. Of those willing to pay more in taxes, 73 percent were willing to pay up to $25 more annually in taxes. Significantly, those residents who had heard of the community court or who owned their residence were most likely to be willing to contribute to the court.

The 2005 study of Red Hook, Brooklyn reported that 76 percent of respondents had a positive feeling about having a community-based court in their neighborhood. Another Red Hook study, published in 2004, documented that those who lived in public housing or who identified as “black” had more negative perceptions of their community. A similar community survey was conducted in Hennepin in 2001 and found that almost two thirds of respondents (65.6 percent) thought that the county was not harsh enough with criminals.

Processing Efficiency
The Midtown study documents speedier case processing in community court, as does the 2000 Hennepin study. In the first three years that the Midtown Court was open, the average arrest-to-arraignment time was 18.9 hours compared to 29.2 hours at the downtown Manhattan court. The Hennepin Court also achieved quicker case processing, even though more appearances were required before disposition. The average number of days from court filing to disposition was 78.9 for the Hennepin community court defendants, compared to 80 and 124 for the two comparison groups used in that study. However, from arraignment to disposition, the community court needed 6.4 appearances compared to only 3.2 and 4.2 for the comparison defendants. The authors of the Hennepin study speculate that the increased number of appearances in the community court are, in large part, due to the increased number of compliance monitoring appearances needed to hold offenders accountable.

Reduced Crime
The Midtown study is the only one to tackle the impact on crime in the community, documenting encouraging results: Prostitution arrests were down 56 percent and illegal vending arrests were down 24 percent following the opening of the community court. Data from ethnographic observations and individual interviews confirmed this drop in criminal activity. In addition, defendants who had completed at least 90 days of court-mandated drug treatment demonstrated a reduction in annual arrest rate over three years compared to prior to the Midtown intervention (2.3 annual arrests pre-Midtown versus 0.9 post-Midtown).

Cost-Benefit Analysis
The 2000 Hennepin study includes a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis. Overall, the community court was found to be more expensive than regular case processing, costing an additional net $704.52 per case, but the authors noted that there are many additional benefits that cannot be quantified in monetary value to offset the costs. The only benefit that was included is the value of community service performed by defendants. Other benefits included the improved quality of life in the neighborhood and the improved quality and efficiency of decision-making due to increased information sharing.

The Midtown study includes a cost-benefit analysis, as well, but that analysis is, by the authors’ own admission, limited due to lack of ability to quantify fully all benefits and costs. What the Midtown study did find, though, are significant monetary benefits to the court system—including approximately $100,000 in reduced costs due to decreased pre-arraignment detention, $500,000 in reduced costs due to reduced use of jail, $570,000 in future reduced costs due to reduced prostitution arrests, and $150,000 in benefits derived from the community service of defendants—for a total of approximately $1.3 million annually.

Offender Perceptions
The Hartford study included interviews with offenders to document their perceptions of their experience. Overall, offenders thought the community court was a good idea (96 percent), that their sentence was fair (73 percent), that the community court was helping Hartford neighborhoods (83 percent), and that all people were treated fairly at the community court (61 percent). Similarly, the Red Hook community survey (Moore 2004) found that the majority (56 percent) of those who had had a case at the Justice Center reported a positive experience. The Hartford offenders also thought the prosecutor was fair (76 percent) and an overwhelming majority (91 percent) thought they were treated with respect by the judge. As is typical in Connecticut for misdemeanor cases, most defendants had no legal representation (79 percent). Many thought they needed a lawyer (84 percent).

The Midtown study included interviews with female prostitutes who had been arrested and brought to the Midtown Community Court. These women had both positive and negative comments about the Court. On the positive side, they commented that, compared to the traditional downtown court, the community court processed their cases quicker, the holding cells were cleaner, the food was better, and the staff more sympathetic. On the other hand, the women complained that the alternative sentences at Midtown made it more difficult for them to “work”; furthermore, many women mentioned that they would continue to engage in prostitution, but would move out of the Midtown catchment area. (In response the Midtown Community Court made several efforts to combat the potential “displacement effect.” Most notably, the Court now handles all prostitution arrests in Manhattan.)

Both Hennepin studies included offender interviews or focus groups. The 2000 study included a handful of semi-structured interviews with defendants who had been sentenced to community-based services. These four defendants felt that the community court gave them the opportunity and the help they needed to break out of the cycle of rearrest by linking them to needed services.

Stakeholder Perceptions
The 2000 Hennepin study included focus groups and interviews with stakeholders of the community court, including staff and treatment providers. The treatment providers in particular were pleased with the court’s linking offenders to services, holding them accountable, and locating key service providers in the same building.

In Hartford, staff felt that reacting strongly to quality-of-life crimes prevents future offenses because offenders know these actions are going to be taken seriously. Similar to Hennepin, Hartford staff liked the balance between punishment and help and thought accountability was important. Overall, Hartford staff thought the community court provides an “opportunity for a second chance” with “a client-centered” social service delivery system. The Hartford study also included interviews with staff that documented the implementation challenges and barriers in opening an innovative program within the criminal justice system.

Conclusion
As the community court model spreads across the country, it is important for the evaluation literature to catch up. There are several methodologies highlighted here, but, to date, no one single study has covered all aspects of evaluation—process evaluation, outcome evaluation, community impact survey, offender perceptions, and cost-benefit analysis. The Midtown and Hennepin evaluations come the closest but are now several years old. Future analysis should seek to give a more comprehensive picture of these complex projects.

References
Eckberg, Deborah, 2001, Hennepin County Community Justice Project: Summary Report of Short-Term Evaluation, Hennepin County District Court Research Department.

Frazer, M. Somjen, 2005, Op Data, 2004: Red Hook, Brooklyn, Center for Court Innovation.

Goldkamp, J., D. Weiland, and C. Irons-Guynn, 2000, Developing an Evaluation Plan for Community Courts: Assessing the Hartford Community Court Model, Crime and Justice Research Institute.

Malkin, Victoria, 2003, Community Courts and the Process of Accountability—Means to What End? (unpublished paper).

Moore, Kelli, 2004, Op Data, 2001: Red Hook, Brooklyn, Center for Court Innovation.

The Justice Education Center, Inc, 2002, Evaluation of the Hartford Community Court, The Justice Education Center, Inc.

Sviridoff, M., D. Rottman, B. Ostrom and R. Curtis, 2000, Dispensing Justice Locally: The Implementation and Effects of the Midtown Community Court, Harwood Academic Publishers, Amsterdam.

Sviridoff, M., D. Rottman, R. Weidner, F. Cheesman, R. Curtis, R. Hansen, and B. Ostrom, 2001, Dispensing Justice Locally: The Impacts, Cost and Benefits of the Midtown Community Court, Center for Court Innovation.

Weidner, R., and C. Davis, 2000, Benefits and Costs of the Hennepin County Community Court—A Preliminary Analysis, Institute on Criminal Justice, University of Minnesota Law School.

In 1992, Patrick Daly, a principal at an elementary school in Red Hook, was accidentally murdered in a drug-related shoot-out. In the months following his death, Brooklyn D.A. Charles J. Hynes began to speak out publicly about public safety in Red Hook, saying that the neighborhood would be an ideal location for a community court.

In 1994, Greg Berman was hired as the lead planner for the Red Hook Community Justice Center. The following are excerpts from his Planning Diary, which he wrote as a record of how he negotiated some of the challenges of early planning, including community needs assessment, fundraising and program design. To read the entire document, click here.

In 1992, Patrick Daly, a principal at an elementary school in Red Hook, was accidentally murdered in a drug-related shoot-out. In the months following his death, Brooklyn D.A. Charles J. Hynes began to speak out publicly about public safety in Red Hook, saying that the neighborhood would be an ideal location for a community court. His remarks started the ball rolling. There were other factors that made Red Hook an attractive site. Most important was the neighborhood’s isolation—it is one of the few communities in New York with easily identifiable borders. In such a well-defined community, it is easier for a demonstration project like a community court to have a concentrated impact. It is also simpler for researchers to measure that impact.

One of the very first things that happened after I accepted the job as planner was a series of focus groups with Red Hook residents. The Brooklyn D.A.’s Office helped put the groups together, bringing in an outside consultant to facilitate the conversations. We held separate discussions with community leaders, social service providers, young people and single moms. Red Hook is small enough—it has less than 11,000 residents—that we were able to get just about all of the major players in the neighborhood to come, as well as reach beneath them to talk directly with their constituents. More than 50 people attended the groups, which were held at the Red Hook Public Library. Participants were asked a series of fairly simple questions: What are the major problems in Red Hook? How might a community court help address them? What should be the court’s priorities? The conversations were extremely lively. I remember that once people started talking it was difficult to get them to stop—several of the groups ran well over their allotted times.

I learned a couple of important things from the focus groups. The first was that despite Red Hook’s reputation for drugs and serious violence, the way that local residents talked about their community was not markedly different from the way that residents of Midtown Manhattan talked about their neighborhood in focus groups held before the creation of the Midtown Community Court. Quality-of-life conditions—graffiti, littering, noise violations, loitering—weighed heavily on the minds of those who participated in the focus groups. I remember one participant saying, "Violations do not receive any priority. ... We need a [better] quality of life. Even the schools are not safe." Another expressed the feelings of many when he said, "The court system has failed us. ... [Offenders] go through revolving doors."

But low-level offending was not the only thing on the minds of the focus group participants. Red Hook residents had problems that took them to Family Court and Civil Court as well as Criminal Court. These included disputes with landlords, small claims cases and domestic violence issues. Several participants lamented the jurisdictional boundaries of New York’s court system. One person said, "You can’t divide a person up. You have to have a comprehensive look at the whole person. The community court could do that." Comments like this one confirmed our initial hunch that a community court in a neighborhood like Red Hook should be multi-jurisdictional, that it should attempt to address the full range of legal issues faced by local residents, not just criminal matters.

Finally, participants in the focus groups urged the court to be as aggressive as possible in providing social services. One recommended that the court look at "the total picture—spousal abuse, victim services, teenagers, mentor programs, mock court, parenting skills." From comments like these, we began to fashion a notion that the court should provide services not just to defendants, as the Midtown Community Court does, but to everyone who is touched by crime in Red Hook—defendants, victims and those in the community who were simply concerned about public safety. It was not long after the focus groups that we decided to call the project a "community justice center" instead of a community court. We thought that "community justice center" better signified our intention to build much more than just a courtroom in Red Hook.

Given its history, it is fair to say that many Red Hookers were understandably hesitant about ambitious new government initiatives. In attempting to win community support for the Justice Center, this attitude would prove to be planners' largest obstacle.

In 1994, Greg Berman was hired as the lead planner for the Red Hook Community Justice Center. The following are excerpts from his Planning Diary, which he wrote as a record of how he negotiated some of the challenges of early planning, including community needs assessment, fundraising and program design. To read the entire document, click here.

The focus groups were productive sessions, unearthing a treasure trove of valuable data about community attitudes and expectations. At the same time, they were a useful tool for building neighborhood support, as I discovered in the days that followed.

Red Hook is a neighborhood with a deep skepticism about government initiatives, a skepticism that is rooted in a history of government neglect and unwanted intervention. Many Red Hook residents feel that their community is home to a disproportionate number of undesirable government projects. They point to the neighborhood’s methadone clinic and waste transfer station as prime examples. They also feel that their neighborhood’s character was forever changed for the worse by Robert Moses, the master builder of New York, who essentially cut the neighborhood off from the rest of Brooklyn when he constructed the elevated Gowanus Parkway in the 1940s.

Given this history, it is fair to say that many Red Hookers are understandably hesitant about ambitious new government initiatives, no matter how good they sound on paper. In attempting to win community support for the Justice Center, this attitude would prove to be our largest obstacle. We got off to a good start in overcoming it with the focus groups. Almost by accident, we had sent a powerful message to Red Hook residents by convening the focus groups. And that message was: your voice counts. The focus groups were a visible sign that we intended to consult the community at each step of the process. This was not lost on participants.

Over the next several months, I met individually with every stakeholder that I could think of: business owners, clergy, tenant leaders, elected officials, police officers, Housing Authority administrators, local social service providers and others. As an outsider to the community, I took pains to emphasize that I was there to learn from them, that my job was to help translate their concerns and their ideas into concrete programs. In general, people were generous with their time and grateful to be asked their opinion.

I also went to as many public meetings in Red Hook as possible. At some, I spoke about the Justice Center. At others, I went just to listen. This sent the message that I wasn’t coming to the community as a carpetbagger, that I was interested in more than just selling a bill of goods. 
 
What I learned from all of these encounters was that there is no substitute for face time. In other words, it is impossible to build meaningful relationships with people without investing significant time and energy. As the months passed, I found my connections with community leaders deepening. I met their children, attended their church services, wrote them letters of recommendation, ate dinner with them, and supported several of their neighborhood charity efforts. These ties would serve the Justice Center well when it was necessary to mobilize neighborhood support for a grant proposal, a newspaper article or a public meeting.

To my surprise, my outreach efforts revealed very few concerns about the Justice Center. The few issues that did come up were less about the concept than about process: Who would direct the Justice Center once it opened? What were we doing about jobs for neighborhood residents? Would the Justice Center have a community advisory board?

Given these concerns, we decided to create a formal vehicle for community input. For the last 30 years, New York City has had a network of 59 "community boards" that are responsible for advising the city’s administration about land use and other neighborhood issues. Several dozen community representatives sit on each board. Early on, Community Board 6 in Brooklyn, which includes Red Hook, agreed to convene a special task force devoted to the Justice Center. During the first years of planning, this task force functioned as a de facto advisory board for the project. They convened public meetings about the project every three months or so. These sessions were a valuable opportunity for community residents to stay informed about the Justice Center and for us to keep our fingers on the pulse of the neighborhood.

In 1994, Greg Berman was hired as the lead planner for the Red Hook Community Justice Center. The following are excerpts from his Planning Diary, which he wrote as a record of how he negotiated some of the challenges of early planning, including community needs assessment, fundraising and program design. To read the entire document, click here.

I was not alone in trying to build community support for the Justice Center. From the start, I enjoyed the active partnership of the Brooklyn D.A.’s Office. Two attorneys in particular—Gene Lopez and Carl Thomas—were instrumental. Their presence, and the D.A.’s early endorsement, lent the project immediate credibility.

I think it is important to note that the partnership with the D.A.’s office is not a make-believe or paper partnership, but a real-world relationship fraught with real-world tensions and conflicts. Although we share a common goal—creating a neighborhood justice center—we both have our own organizational agendas and pressures outside of Red Hook. Inter-agency collaboration takes patience, but in my experience it is well worth the effort. The D.A.’s office has helped enrich the planning process, bringing additional resources—and a different institutional perspective—to the table.

While the relationship with the D.A.’s office was the most intimate, it was by no means the only partnership that was forged in the early days of the project. Another crucial partner was Victim Services, New York’s largest victim assistance agency, which runs programs throughout the city’s neighborhoods, including Red Hook.

Bringing Victim Services into the planning process made perfect sense; Red Hook is a community in which nearly every resident is at immediate risk of being a crime victim. Similarly, many residents know someone, either a friend or relative, who has been the perpetrator of crime. In this environment, a community justice center must be aggressive about providing victims with assistance and giving them a voice in the justice process. Victim Services has been instrumental in helping us think through these issues.

n 1994, Greg Berman was hired as the lead planner for the Red Hook Community Justice Center. The following are excerpts from his Planning Diary, which he wrote as a record of how he negotiated some of the challenges of early planning, including community needs assessment, fundraising and program design. To read the entire document, click here.

Siting a new project is almost always a tricky business, particularly in a city like New York, where real estate is an extremely precious—and political—commodity. Thankfully, Red Hook offered one major advantage in this regard. Because of the dramatic population and business flight out of the neighborhood over the preceding 25 years, Red Hook has a number of vacant and abandoned properties. After investigating all of the city-owned sites in the neighborhood—and inspecting several privately-held properties as well—eight sites emerged as viable options. Each was close to public transportation and each was large enough to house both a courtroom and social service programs.

In an effort to narrow the list further, we organized a bus tour for local community leaders from the Community Board 6 task force. After looking at all of the possibilities, their clear first choice was Visitation School, a vacant parochial school that had closed its doors in the 1970s.

Visitation struck their fancy for several reasons. First, it was located in between "the front" and the "the back." In Red Hook parlance, "the front" signifies the public housing projects. "The back" is the area closer to the waterfront, which is composed of single-family row houses that are occupied primarily by Italian and Irish Americans. Visitation, in effect, is situated in neutral territory—it "belongs" to neither the front nor the back. This is an important political consideration in Red Hook. 
 
On an emotional level, many residents were drawn to Visitation because it had once been an important community resource. They looked at the Justice Center as an opportunity to bring back to life a magnificent old building. And magnificent is precisely the word to describe it: built at the turn of the century, Visitation School has the kind of dignified street presence that you might expect from a neighborhood courthouse. And, as it turned out, Catholic Charities, which owned the building, was willing to lease it to us for a reasonable price and play an active role in making the project happen. End of story, right? Wrong.

Visitation was not without its drawbacks. Although the structure itself was in good shape, the interior was a disaster. Asbestos and lead paint were major problems. The roof needed to be replaced. None of the windows were worth saving. It took several months to investigate the building properly—conducting tests, analyzing results, meeting with engineers and construction managers, preparing preliminary architectural drawings. After all was said and done, we got the bad news: it would cost several million dollars to renovate the building.