What does this measure?

The average daily county jail population, divided by the total population in the county, presented per 1,000 residents. This includes county inmates who are detained while awaiting trial, civilly committed or criminally sentenced but does not include inmates in state or federal prisons.

Why is this important?

Incarceration serves to remove offenders from a community, but also creates hardships on families, including the loss of an income or a caregiver, in addition to long-term effects on mental health for all involved. After incarceration, people often encounter challenges in obtaining meaningful employment, leading to reductions in long-term productivity, recidivism and widespread effects on a community's social, health and educational systems.

How is our county performing?

In 2017, the average Berks County jail population was 900, down 32% from 2006. That amounts to 2.2 county jail inmates per 1,000 residents in Berks County, slightly lower than the incarceration rate to Pennsylvania as a whole. From 2006 to 2017, the incarceration rate in Berks declined from a peak of 3.3 in 2006 to 2.5 in 2011, before rising again in 2012 through 2014. By comparison, the state's incarceration rate has largely been flat since 2006.

Among neighboring counties in 2017, incarceration rates were higher than in Berks in Lebanon, at 3.8 per 1,000 residents, Lehigh, 2.6 and Montgomery, 2.4. Rates were lower in Chester and Lancaster (both at 1.6), and Schuylkill (1.8). Like Berks, Chester, Lancaster, Lebanon, and Lehigh had rates that fluctuated from 2006 to 2017 but in 2017 the rates were lower than 2006. Lehigh had a decline of 36% during this period, while Schuylkill's rate was largely flat and Montgomery increased about 19%.

Notes about the data

Data are from the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency. Data includes all classifications of incarceration and reflects the counties where offenders are housed, which are not necessarily the home counties of offenders or the sentencing counties.

There may be additional research available on this topic. Click on Reports and Resources to learn more.