Shelby County Sheriff's Office

Shelby County, Tennessee (Shelby) is a member of the second cohort of jurisdictions selected to participate in the Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) Network, the centerpiece of the Foundation’s strategy to address overincarceration by reducing jail misuse and overuse. Under a previous award, Shelby implemented a targeted set of policy and practice changes which, while aimed at reducing local incarceration and disparities in jail usage, fell considerably short of their goals. Nevertheless, Shelby’s SJC participation has generated useful learning, and its continued sharing of data and cooperation in SJC research and documentation remain necessary. This award provides limited support for Shelby’s continued participation in the SJC initiative, sharing data and cooperating in SJC performance measurement, evaluation, documentation, and research activities, attending SJC convenings, and otherwise actively participating in the SJC community of practice.

Shelby County, Tennessee, is one of twenty jurisdictions originally selected to participate in the Safety and Justice Challenge Network, the centerpiece of the Foundation’s strategy to address over-incarceration by reducing jail misuse and overuse. A previous award to Shelby County supported efforts to refine its reform strategies and further develop its implementation plan. This one-year award enables Shelby County to continue to participate in the Network and to make targeted changes aimed at reducing local incarceration and disparities in jail usage. The aim is to demonstrate more effective, fairer, and equitable responses to crime and social disorder, creating momentum toward local systems reform nationally.

Following a national competition in 2015, twenty jurisdictions were selected for inclusion in the Safety and Justice Challenge Network, the centerpiece of the Foundation’s strategy to address over-incarceration by reducing jail misuse and overuse. A previous award enabled these sites to assess local drivers of jail incarceration and develop plans to address them. Resulting plans were reviewed with the help of an expert panel, and eleven Core Sites were selected for implementation funding, with the remaining nine partner site jurisdictions to receive smaller awards enabling them to continue to participate in the Challenge Network. Partner sites will use their awards to refine and strengthen their plans for targeting drivers of local incarceration, begin implementation where possible, and continue to share what they learn with other Network sites.

Twenty jurisdictions have been selected, following a nationwide competition, to participate in the Safety and Justice Challenge Network of sites committed to finding ways to safely and sustainably reduce unnecessary jail incarceration. The Safety and Justice Challenge Network is at the core of the Foundation’s initiative to reduce over-incarceration by changing the way America thinks about and uses jails. Awards to these jurisdictions support their participation in a structured data analysis and planning process aimed at assessing drivers of local incarceration and developing multi-stakeholder action plans to address them.