FY2017 Appropriations for the Department of Justice Grant Programs

Contents

• Office on Violence Against Women (OVW)
• Office of Justice Programs (OJP)
• Research, Evaluation, and Statistics
• State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance
• Juvenile Justice Programs
• Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS)
• 21^st Century Justice Initiative

Summary

Each year Congress provides funding for a variety of grant programs through the Department of Justice (DOJ). These programs provide funding to state, local, and tribal governments and nonprofit organizations for a variety of criminal justice-related purposes, such as programs to combat violence against women, reduce backlogs of DNA evidence, support community policing efforts, assist crime victims, promote prisoner reentry efforts, and improve the functioning of the juvenile justice system. Congress funds these programs through five accounts in the annual Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies (CJS) appropriations act: Violence Against Women Programs; Research, Evaluation, and Statistics; State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance; Juvenile Justice Programs; and Community Oriented Policing Services.

For FY2017, the Administration requests a total of $2.361 billion for these five accounts. This includes $489 million for the Office on Violence Against Women (which includes a proposed $326 million transfer from the Crime Victims Fund); $154 million for Research, Evaluation, and Statistics; $1.098 billion for State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance; $334.4 million for Juvenile Justice Programs; and $286 million for Community Oriented Policing Services. The Administration's request for all of these accounts, with the exception of State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance, is greater than the FY2016 appropriation.

The Administration's FY2017 request for DOJ's grant accounts includes several significant proposals. First, the Administration proposes to transfer $326 million from the Crime Victims Fund to the Office on Violence Against Women. It also proposes to eliminate funding for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (-$210 million), while proposing to reduce funding for other programs, such as the National Criminal History Improvement program (-$23 million), and DNA backlog reduction initiatives (-$20 million). However, the Administration also proposes increases for grants to encourage arrest policies (+$11.3 million), grants authorized under the Second Chance Act (+$32 million), and programs for children exposed to violence (+$15 million). In addition, it proposes restoring funding to the Juvenile Accountability Block Grant (+$30 million), a program that was eliminated after FY2013, along with funding a variety of new programs and initiatives, such as the Byrne Incentive Grant program ($10 million), the Byrne Competitive Grant program ($15 million), and the Violence Reduction Network ($5 million).

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FY2017 Appropriations for the Department of Justice Grant Programs

Each year Congress provides funding for a variety of grant programs through the Department of Justice (DOJ). These programs provide funding to state, local, and tribal governments and nonprofit organizations for a variety of criminal justice-related purposes, such as programs to combat violence against women, reduce backlogs of DNA evidence, support community policing efforts, assist crime victims, promote prisoner reentry efforts, and improve the functioning of the juvenile justice system. Congress funds these programs through five accounts in the annual Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies (CJS) appropriations act: Violence Against Women Programs; Research, Evaluation, and Statistics; State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance; Juvenile Justice Programs; and Community Oriented Policing Services. This report provides an overview of congressional actions to fund DOJ's grant programs through these accounts for FY2017. The report also provides information on FY2016 appropriations for DOJ's grant programs.

Office on Violence Against Women (OVW)

The Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) was established to administer programs created under the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) of 1994 and subsequent legislation. These programs provide financial and technical assistance to communities around the country to facilitate the creation of programs, policies, and practices designed to improve criminal justice responses related to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, and stalking.

The Administration's FY2017 request for OVW is $489 million, 1.9% more than the FY2016 appropriation of $480 million. Of note, the Administration proposes transferring $326 million from the Crime Victims Fund to the OVW. The Administration's FY2017 request is mostly in-line with the FY2016 appropriation, but it requests increases for grants to encourage arrest policies (+$11.3 million), civil legal assistance (+$7.5 million), grants to combat violence on college campuses (+$6.0 million), grants to combat abuse against the elderly (+$1.3 million), and grants to strengthen tribal justice systems so they can exert their jurisdiction over domestic violence cases (+$2.5 million). The Administration also proposes funding two new initiatives through set-asides from other grant programs: reducing firearm lethality in domestic violence cases and enhancing colleges' responses to instances of sexual assault. The Administration's request proposes reducing funding for Service-Training-Officers-Prosecutors Formula Grant (STOP) grants by $15 million.

Office of Justice Programs (OJP)

The Office of Justice Programs (OJP) manages and coordinates the National Institute of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office of Victims of Crimes, Bureau of Justice Assistance, and related grant programs.

Research, Evaluation, and Statistics

The Research, Evaluation, and Statistics account (formerly the Justice Assistance account) funds the operations of the Bureau of Justice Statistics and the National Institute of Justice, among other things.

The Administration requests $154 million for this account for FY2017, a 32.8% increase over the FY2016 appropriation of $116 million. It requests increases in funding for the Bureau of Justice Statistics (+$17 million) and the National Institute of Justice (+$12 million). The Administration also proposes funding research on domestic radicalization as its own line item instead of a set-aside from the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) program. It requests $10 million to collect and report nationwide incident-based crime statistics.

State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance

The State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance account includes funding for a variety of grant programs to improve the functioning of state, local, and tribal criminal justice systems. Some examples of programs that have traditionally been funded under this account include the JAG program, the Drug Courts program, the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP), and DNA backlog reduction grants.

The FY2017 request for the State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance account is $1.098 billion, which would be 22.1% less than the FY2016 appropriation of $1.409 billion. The Administration proposes eliminating funding for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (-$210 million); the Paul Coverdell Forensic Sciences Improvement Program (-$13.5 million); grants to assist trafficking victims (-$45 million); the John R. Justice program, which helps with student loan forgiveness for attorneys in public service (-$2 million); and assistance for Indian tribes (-$30 million). However, it proposes to fund grants to assist trafficking victims with funds from the Crime Victims Fund. The Administration also proposes to use 7% of the funding under the State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance, Juvenile Justice Programs, and Research, Evaluation, and Statistics accounts to support tribal justice programs. In addition, it proposes reducing funding for the JAG program (-$92.5 million, though this is largely the result of eliminating the set-aside for security at the Presidential Nominating Conventions), the National Criminal History Improvement program (-$23 million), and DNA backlog reduction initiatives (-$20 million).

While the Administration proposes eliminating or reducing funding for several programs under the State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance account, it has also proposed increasing funding for programs like reentry initiatives authorized under the Second Chance Act (+$32 million), programs for children exposed to violence (+$15 million), grants for residential substance abuse treatment (+$2 million) and programs to assist people with mental illness in the criminal justice system (+$4 million).

In addition, the Administration requests funding for several new programs under the State and Local Law Enforcement Assistance account, including

• $10 million for the Byrne Incentive Grant program, which would be used to make supplemental grants to JAG program grantees who choose to use a portion of their JAG funding to support programs or initiatives that are evidence-based, or are promising and will be coupled with rigorous evaluation to determine their effectiveness;
• $15 million for the Byrne Competitive Grant program, which would be used to implement evidence-based and data-driven strategies on issues of national significance;
• $20 million for grants and technical assistance to state, local, and tribal courts and juvenile and criminal justice agencies to support efforts to improve the perception of fairness in the juvenile and criminal justice systems and to build community trust;
• $5 million for the Violence Reduction Network, which allows cities to develop data-driven, evidence-based strategies to reduce violence by consulting directly with and receiving coordinated training and technical assistance from multiple DOJ components; and
• $6 million for grants for efforts to counter violent extremism.

Juvenile Justice Programs

The Juvenile Justice Programs account includes funding for grant programs to reduce juvenile delinquency and help state, local, and tribal governments improve the functioning of their juvenile justice systems.

For FY2017, the Administration requests $334.4 million for the Juvenile Justice Programs account, a 23.8% increase over the FY2016 appropriation of $270.2 million. The Administration's FY2017 request includes proposals to increase funding for the Part B formula grants program (+$17 million), Title V grants (+$24.5 million), and the Community-based Violence Prevention Initiative (+$10 million). The Administration is also requesting that funding be restored to the Juvenile Accountability Block Grants ($30 million), which were eliminated after FY2013. In addition, it requests $20 million for a Smart on Juvenile Justice Initiative, which would provide supplemental incentive grant awards to foster better outcomes for system-involved youth. The Administration did propose to reduce funding for youth mentoring grants (-$32 million), investigation and prosecution of child abuse programs (-$9 million), and the missing and exploited children program (-$5.2 million).

Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS)

The Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) Office awards grants to state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies throughout the United States so they can hire and train law enforcement officers to participate in community policing, purchase and deploy new crime-fighting technologies, and develop and test new and innovative policing strategies.

The Administration's FY2017 request for COPS is $74 million (34.9%) more than the FY2016 appropriation of $212 million. The Administration requests a $42 million increase in funding for the COPS hiring program. It would also establish the Tribal Resources Grant program and training and technical assistance on COPS's collaborative reform model as separate line items in the account rather than set-asides from the funding for the hiring program.

21^st Century Justice Initiative

As a part of its FY2017 budget request for DOJ, the Administration requests $500 million for the 21^st Century Justice Initiative. This proposed initiative would be a new mandatory program that would invest $5 billion—$500 million a year for 10 years—in criminal justice reform efforts. The initiative would use federal funding to promote innovative approaches to reducing both crime and unnecessary incarceration. The program would focus on achieving three objectives: reducing crime, reversing practices that have led to unnecessarily long sentences and unnecessary incarceration, and building community trust. States would be able to use funding to focus on one or more of the following in both the adult and juvenile systems: (1) examining and changing state laws and policies that contribute to unnecessarily long sentences and unnecessary incarceration, without sacrificing public safety; (2) promoting critical advancements in community-oriented policing; and (3) providing comprehensive diversionary and reentry services. In addition, this initiative would dedicate 10% of the funding for reform efforts in the federal criminal justice system, including improving skills, education, mental health, addiction, and other recidivism-reduction programming in the Bureau of Prisons.

Author Contact Information

Key Policy Staff