About the Safety and Justice Program
The RAND Safety and Justice Program conducts research on topics related to public safety and the performance of the U.S. criminal justice system for federal law enforcement and other agencies, urban police departments, and other clients. Policy and research areas include policing, law enforcement, and corrections; crime, gangs, and violence prevention; drug abuse and drug policy; administration of justice, law, courts, and governance; and occupational and transportation safety.
Featured Research: California's Prisons
With the health care safety net in California under stress from the state's continuing financial crisis, jurisdictions across the state face unprecedented challenges caring for the health and social service needs of people released from state prisons.
PRGS professors Greg Ridgeway and Lois Davis joined senior California officials at a recent RAND Policy Forum to discuss "California's Prisoners Dilemma": how cash-strapped local governments can meet the basic medical needs of the thousands of early-release prisoners.
Selected News and Publications
Driving Mexican marijuana out of the U.S. would probably reduce the traffickers' export revenue by a few billion dollars a year, writes Beau Kilmer. But would reducing that revenue lead to a corresponding decrease in trafficker violence?
Beau Kilmer, co-director of the RAND Drug Policy Research Center and coauthor of
Marijuana Legalization: What Everyone Needs to Know, hosted an “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) session on Reddit this week. He fielded questions from participants on a variety of drug policy issues.
Policymakers in Washington and Colorado are confronting some new and tricky issues that have never been addressed. For them, and for anyone else thinking about changing their pot laws, there are seven key decision areas that will shape the costs and benefits of marijuana legalization.
Using zoning laws to shape the type of development and activity that occur in a neighborhood may be one way to reduce crime in urban areas. Single-use commercially zoned blocks in Los Angeles have crime rates that are 45 percent higher than similar blocks that include residential uses.
Initiatives to legalize and regulate marijuana leave local, state, and federal policymakers facing new questions. To help leaders better understand the possible consequences, DPRC researchers moderated a forum in Washington, D.C., on February 11, 2013, about developing public health regulations for marijuana.
RAND congratulates senior policy researcher Lois Davis, whose work on the public health consequences of prisoner re-entry in California earned RAND the 64th Assembly District's AB 109 Re-Entry Award.
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