BJS releases "Census of State and Federal Adult Correctional Facilities, 2019 – Statistical Tables"

Via email, I learned that the Bureau of Justice Statistics has released this new report providing a US correctional census with "data collected from state, federal, and private adult correctional facilities on the characteristics of facilities by type, operator, size, physical security level, capacity, court orders, and programs." This report provides a pre-COVID era snapshot o f US carceral realities, as decribed at the start of the 24-page report:

At midyear 2019, there were a total of 1,677 adult correctional facilities in the United States.1 Of these, 111 were operated by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP), 1,155 were operated by state correctional authorities, and 411 were privately operated (table 1).  Confinement facilities made up 69% of all adult facilities, and community-based facilities made up the remaining 31% (figure 1).

Confinement facilities held about 95% of all prisoners reported at midyear 2019.  About 8 in 10 (83%) confinement facilities were operated by state authorities, and those facilities held a comparable percentage of prisoners in confinement facilities (82%) (figure 2).  About 2 in 3 (64%) community-based facilities were privately operated, and those private facilities housed about half (51%) of prisoners reported in community-based facilities at midyear 2019.

Statistics in this report are based on the 2019 Census of State and Federal Correctional Facilities (CCF).  The CCF covers adult correctional facilities operated by state departments of corrections, BOP, and private contractors in all 50 states, including the combined jail and prison systems in Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Rhode Island, and Vermont.