CORRECTIONS AND SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES: THE IMPACT ON LOCAL POPULATIONS.

The concept of sustainable communities has provided a context for policy analvsis in a wide variety of areas. It has not, however, found wide application in criminal justice. This paper will examine corrections, including imprisonment, from the perspective of community su tainability. An analysis of incarceration levels and the concentration of parolees and probationers in a northeastern city is used to examine this idea. Data reveal high concentrations of corrections populations in high crime neighborhoods. Census data also show declines in populations of young men and over all declines in parenting aged adults in the same neighborhoods. The data sugge t that corrections policy and incarceration in particular has been harmful to sustainability in urban poor neighborhoods. The pattern found are inconsistent with contemporary views on desirable social structure and neighborhood efficacy. With growing interest in areas such as reenlly and mas incarceration, sustainability may provide a useful context for analyses in criminal justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]