Measuring Diversion: The Florida Community Control Program

Abstract

The prison crowding crisis has caused many states to implement intensive community supervision programs in an attempt to divert convicted offenders from prison. The Florida Community Control Program (FCCP), which places offenders under house arrest or electronic survelliance, is the largest, best-established prison diversion effort in the United States. During the last six years, Florida courts have used objective guideline criteria to sentence more than 25,000 offenders to the community control program. This article describes an effort to evaluate the impact of the FCCP on prison crowding in Florida. The research compares the characteristics of offenders sentenced to prison before and after the FCCP implementation and attempts to account for changes in sentencing policy in order to measure the diversionary effect of the program.