Alaska’s Criminal Justice Reforms (2016)

On July 11, 2016, Alaska Governor Bill Walker (I) signed into law research-driven legislation that aims to deliver a greater public safety return on the state’s spending. The Alaska Criminal Justice Commission, an interbranch task force of state and local officials and practitioners, developed the policy foundations for S.B. 91 with technical assistance from The Pew Charitable Trusts as part of the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, a partnership between Pew and the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance. The pretrial, sentencing, and corrections reforms are expected to reduce the number of inmates by 13 percent. The state estimates that the law will yield savings of $380 million, and it plans to invest nearly $100 million of that in victims’ services and evidence-based prison alternatives.