Facts and Policy Reforms for Colorado
Like most states, Colorado’s prison population has exploded in recent decades.
Between 1980 and 2016, the number of people in the state’s prisons grew by a stunning 661 percent. Without reform, the number of people imprisoned in Colorado is projected to increase by 38 percent by 2024.
As in many states, the rise in Colorado’s prison population was led in part by the proliferation of drug laws and their aggressive enforcement. In 2016, one in every seven people admitted to prison had a drug-related sentence. Following reforms in 2013, drug possession admissions slowly decreased, but there has been a significant increase in felony drug possession filings in recent years. Probation revocations also contribute to the overburdened prison population. Roughly one in four probation sentences ends with an individual being incarcerated for either a technical violation or a new crime.
Unsurprisingly, Colorado’s mass incarceration crisis has had an enormous impact on people of color, especially Black people. Colorado ranked fourth in the country for the rate of Latinos imprisoned in 2014, and ninth in the country for the rate of Black people imprisoned that same year. Ending mass incarceration is a critical — although insufficient — step towards addressing racial disparities in Colorado’s criminal justice system as well as its broader society.
Women are also being sent to prison in Colorado at alarming rates. Between 2000 and 2018, the female prison population increased by 58 percent. People with mental health and substance use disorders are also overrepresented in the prison population. Nearly two out of five people imprisoned in Colorado were considered to have mental health needs as of June 2018, yet only 5 percent of the prison population was enrolled in a mental health program.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
Colorado can dramatically reduce its prison population by implementing just a few sensible reforms:
- Increasing opportunities for pre-arrest diversion, particularly for drug charges.
- Decriminalizing nonviolent conduct and reclassifying nonviolent felony offenses to misdemeanors.
- Enacting presumptive parole for people with a multiyear record of safe behavior in prison.
- Encouraging substance abuse treatment as an alternative to jail or prison time.
- Reconsidering recent legislation such as H.B. 15-1043, which created a new class of felony DUI offenders.
If Colorado were to follow these and other reforms in this Smart Justice 50-State Blueprint, by 2025 it could have 9,085 fewer people in its prison system, saving over $675 million that could be invested in schools, services, and other resources that would strengthen communities. (Total prison population reduction may be +/- 1 due to rounding.)
For more information, along with detailed breakdowns of Colorado’s prison population and the reforms needed to reduce it, click here.