I 

116TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. R. 8647 

To establish a new Justice Department grant program to reduce the number 

of individuals incarcerated in local jails, reduce the number of days 

individuals are incarcerated in local jails, and support community-led 

local justice reinvestment. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

OCTOBER 20, 2020 

Mr. TRONE (for himself and Mr. ARMSTRONG) introduced the following bill; 

which was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary 

A BILL 

To establish a new Justice Department grant program to 

reduce the number of individuals incarcerated in local 

jails, reduce the number of days individuals are incarcerated in local jails, and support community-led local justice reinvestment. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Community First Pre5 trial Reform and Jail Decarceration Act’’. 


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1 SEC. 2. GRANTS AUTHORIZED. 

2 (a) GRANTS AUTHORIZED.—The Attorney General, 

3 acting through the Bureau of Justice Assistance, shall 

4 make grants to eligible partnerships for purposes of reduc5 ing the number of individuals in jails operated by units 

6 of local government and the number of days such individ7 uals spend in jail as follows: 

8 (1) Grants for analysis and planning, which 

9 shall be used to— 

10 (A) collect and analyze local criminal jus11 tice and incarceration data, including data on 

12 racial and ethnic disparities; and 

13 (B) develop a strategic, collaborative plan 

14 to decrease local jail incarceration that shall be 

15 public facing. 

16 (2) Grants for implementation of the plan de17 scribed in paragraph (1)(B) and which may be used 

18 for activities to reduce the number of individuals in19 carcerated in local jails and to reduce the number of 

20 days that individuals are so incarcerated including— 

21 (A) eliminating or reducing the use of cash 

22 bail; 

23 (B) reducing revocations of conditional re24 lease; 

25 (C) creating or increasing the availability 

26 of pretrial services, including efforts undertaken 


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1 in collaboration with community-based organi2 zations and nonprofits; 

3 (D) investing in case processing and proc4 esses to reduce overall time to disposition and 

5 time between court events; 

6 (E) ensuring early assignment of counsel 

7 and presence of counsel at individuals’ first 

8 court appearance or bail hearing; 

9 (F) providing training to various actors 

10 within the criminal justice system on indigent 

11 defense that is aligned with best practices in 

12 the field; 

13 (G) creating or expanding diversion pro14 grams that do not require an individual to enter 

15 into a guilty plea and do not use incarceration 

16 as a sanction for noncompliance— 

17 (i) at the pre-arrest phase; 

18 (ii) at the pre-booking phase; and 

19 (iii) at the post-booking phase; or 

20 (H) any other emerging, promising, or evi21 dence-based practices that an eligible partner22 ship proposes and the Attorney General deems 

23 likely to reduce local jail incarceration. 


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1 (b) ELIGIBLE PARTNERSHIP.—An eligible partner2 ship is a partnership between not less than 2 of the fol3 lowing: 

4 (1) A unit of local government. 

5 (2) A territory. 

6 (3) An Indian tribe. 

7 (4) A nonprofit organization. 

8 (c) APPLICATION.—An application for a grant shall 

9 include the following: 

10 (1) Details of the range of pretrial services 

11 available within the jurisdiction where the jail being 

12 targeted for incarceration rate reduction under this 

13 Act is located. 

14 (2) A plan for ongoing process evaluation and 

15 outcome evaluation. 

16 (3) Either— 

17 (A) data— 

18 (i) disaggregated by race, ethnicity, 

19 and gender on incarceration for correc20 tional facilities within the local jurisdiction 

21 for each of the last five calendar years that 

22 includes— 

23 (I) the average daily population; 

24 (II) the percentage of individuals 

25 held pretrial and post-conviction; and 


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1 (III) the average length of stay 

2 for individuals held pretrial and post3 conviction; and 

4 (ii) disaggregated by race, ethnicity, 

5 and gender on arrests made by all law en6 forcement entities operating within the 

7 local jurisdiction over each of the last five 

8 calendar years; or 

9 (B) in the event that elements of such in10 carceration or arrest data are not able to be 

11 compiled and reported, a comprehensive plan to 

12 obtain as much of the unavailable data as pos13 sible within the first year of the award. 

14 SEC. 3. REQUIREMENTS. 

15 (a) IN GENERAL.—Grantees shall— 

16 (1) consult in all phases of planning, implemen17 tation, and evaluation with municipal, county, and 

18 state law enforcement agencies, courts in the local 

19 jurisdiction, public defense organizations and crimi20 nal defense practitioners in the local jurisdiction, 

21 local substance use and mental health authorities, 

22 local community members, local community members 

23 who have been justice-involved, and community24 based organizations and service providers; 


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1 (2) analyze local jail incarceration and arrest 

2 data to identify the drivers of jail incarceration and 

3 racial and ethnic disparities and ground jail popu4 lation reduction strategies in that data; 

5 (3) reduce incarceration rates by no less than 

6 5 percent the first year of an implementation grant, 

7 10 percent in each subsequent year, and 50 percent 

8 by the end of the grant period; 

9 (4) in consultation with the Bureau of Justice 

10 Assistance— 

11 (A) adopt and implement a methodology 

12 for measuring racial and ethnic disparities in 

13 jail incarceration; 

14 (B) set goals for the reduction of racial 

15 and ethnic jail incarceration disparities; and 

16 (C) decrease levels of incarceration across 

17 all races and ethnicities; 

18 (5) engage an external evaluator to coordinate 

19 data collection and reporting in an ongoing fashion 

20 and perform both a process and outcome evaluation, 

21 with support from the Bureau of Justice Assistance; 

22 and 

23 (6) use financial savings created through de24 creased incarceration to sustain programmatic and 

25 community-based efforts to reduce jail incarceration. 


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1 (b) GRANT OVERSIGHT REQUIREMENT.— 

2 (1) IN GENERAL.—If a grantee fails to meet 

3 the incarceration rate and racial and ethnic dispari4 ties reduction requirements under subsection (a)(3) 

5 in any year of the award, the Bureau of Justice As6 sistance shall perform an audit of the use of their 

7 award and the grantee shall implement new strate8 gies based on that audit. If a grantee fails to meet 

9 the incarceration rate and racial and ethnic dispari10 ties reduction requirements under subsection (a)(3) 

11 in any two consecutive years of the award, the At12 torney General shall terminate the award. 

13 (2) MODIFICATION AUTHORITY.—The Bureau 

14 of Justice Assistance may grant a modification to 

15 the incarceration rate reduction requirement under 

16 subsection (a)(3) if the Bureau determines after an 

17 audit that the failure to meet the incarceration rate 

18 reduction requirement was caused by an increase in 

19 population in the covered jurisdiction. If a grantee 

20 fails to meet the modified reduction requirements in 

21 any two subsequent years of the award, the Attorney 

22 General shall terminate the award. 


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1 SEC. 4. GRANT AMOUNTS. 

2 (a) PLANNING GRANTS.—A grant under section 

3 2(a)(1) may be for not more than $100,000 for a single 

4 grantee, and shall be for a term of 1 year. 

5 (b) IMPLEMENTATION GRANTS.—A grant under sec6 tion 2(a)(2) shall be for a term of 6 years, and shall be 

7 structured as follows: 

8 (1) For the first year of the grant term, an 

9 amount shall be disbursed that is to be not less than 

10 $500,000 and not more than $3,000,000, contingent 

11 upon acceptance of a grantee’s proposed budget for 

12 activities under the grant, which may be subject to 

13 revision during the award process. 

14 (2) Award amounts shall decrease annually 

15 by— 

16 (A) 10 percent in the second year; 

17 (B) 15 percent in the third year; 

18 (C) 20 percent in the fourth year; and 

19 (D) 25 percent in the fifth year. 

20 (3) Award amounts during the sixth year of the 

21 award may not be used for programmatic activities 

22 and shall support only program evaluation and the 

23 drafting of a final report, and such funds shall be 

24 available to the grantees until expended. 

25 SEC. 5. SELECTION PRIORITY. 

26 In selecting grantees, the Attorney General shall— 


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1 (1) give priority to applicants from jurisdictions 

2 with the highest incarceration rates that are not al3 ready in decline and whose applications contain the 

4 most ambitious and attainable plans for reducing 

5 that rate; 

6 (2) give additional priority to applicants from 

7 jurisdictions seeking to use funds under this Act to 

8 prevent the local government from expanding the 

9 number of beds in local correctional facilities; 

10 (3) for any year in which there will only be one 

11 new or ongoing award, ensure that a small metro12 politan, micropolitan, or noncore area is the recipi13 ent of the award; 

14 (4) for any year in which there will be more 

15 than one new or ongoing award, ensure that small 

16 metropolitan, micropolitan, or noncore areas are the 

17 recipients of at least two awards; and 

18 (5) for any year in which there will be three or 

19 more new or ongoing awards, ensure that no more 

20 than one large central metropolitan area is a recipi21 ent of an award. 

22 SEC. 6. DEFINITIONS. 

23 In this Act: 

24 (1) The term ‘‘conditional release’’ means pro25 bation, parole, supervised release, home confinement, 


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1 community supervision, and other practices under 

2 which an individual is supervised in the community 

3 by the criminal justice system and may be incarcer4 ated if found in violation of the conditions of their 

5 release. 

6 (2) The term ‘‘diversion’’ means a program or 

7 practice that— 

8 (A) places individuals who come into con9 tact with the criminal justice system into alter10 native processes outside the standard scope of 

11 criminal justice processing; and 

12 (B) reduces an individual’s involvement in 

13 the criminal justice system in both the short 

14 and long term. 

15 (3) The term ‘‘emerging practice’’ means a pro16 gram or practice— 

17 (A) with initial implementation resulting in 

18 decreased local jail incarceration in one or more 

19 communities; and 

20 (B) that will be evaluated through a well21 designed and rigorous study. 

22 (4) The term ‘‘evidence-based practice’’ means 

23 a program or practice that— 

24 (A) is demonstrated to be effective when 

25 implemented with fidelity; 


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1 (B) is based on a clearly articulated and 

2 empirically supported theory; 

3 (C) has measurable outcomes relevant to 

4 reducing jail incarceration, including a detailed 

5 description of the outcomes produced in a par6 ticular population, whether urban or rural; and 

7 (D) has been scientifically tested and prov8 en effective through randomized control studies 

9 or comparison group studies and with the abil10 ity to replicate and scale. 

11 (5) The term ‘‘micropolitan area’’ has the 

12 meaning established under the Centers for Disease 

13 Control and Prevention’s (hereinafter in this Act re14 ferred to as the ‘‘CDC’’) National Center for Health 

15 Statistics Urban-Rural Classification Scheme for 

16 Counties. 

17 (6) The term ‘‘small metropolitan area’’ has the 

18 meaning established under the CDC’s National Cen19 ter for Health Statistics Urban-Rural Classification 

20 Scheme for Counties. 

21 (7) The term ‘‘noncore areas’’ has the meaning 

22 established under the CDC’s National Center for 

23 Health Statistics Urban-Rural Classification Scheme 

24 for Counties. 


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1 (8) The term ‘‘post-booking diversion’’ means a 

2 program or practice that diverts individuals from 

3 formal criminal justice system processing after for4 mal intake processing into jail. 

5 (9) The term ‘‘pre-booking diversion’’ means a 

6 program or practice that diverts individuals from 

7 formal criminal justice system processing prior to 

8 arrest or prior to formal intake processing into jail. 

9 (10) The term ‘‘promising practice’’ means a 

10 program or practice that— 

11 (A) is demonstrated to be effective based 

12 on positive outcomes relevant to reducing jail 

13 incarceration from one or more objective, inde14 pendent, and scientifically valid evaluations, as 

15 documented in writing to the Attorney General; 

16 and 

17 (B) will be evaluated through a well-de18 signed and rigorous study. 

19 SEC. 7. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 

20 There are authorized to be appropriated— 

21 (1) $20,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2021 

22 through 2025 for planning grants; and 

23 (2) $100,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2021 

24 through 2025 for implementation grants, of which 


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1 10 percent of any appropriated amount is reserved 

2 specifically for evaluation activities. 

Æ 


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