Jacob Farmer / jfarmer@yelmonline.com
In an effort to promote data transparency and accountability, the Thurston County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, along with Measures for Justice, a national nonprofit, unveiled a new data tool that the office says will provide the public direct access to accurate and regularly updated criminal justice data.
The tool, known as Commons, was previewed during a joint presentation at South Puget Sound Community College in Lacey on Tuesday, June 24.
Jon Tunheim, Thurston County’s elected prosecuting attorney, began by saying the criminal justice system has been “notoriously bad at data” during his three decades in the field. He explained further.
“We are a system where there’s a strong philosophical belief that justice is individualized, that there are so many individualized factors that need to be considered when you’re doing cases,” Tunheim said.
“And so, the data doesn’t really play a role in that. In fact, there are decisions out of our courts of appeals that say it’s error for a trial judge or a sentencing judge to look at data and take data into account in terms of making a sentencing decision or other decision in a particular case. And so it’s just not been part of our culture, for, you know, the history of the system.”
For obvious reasons, Tunheim said, there’s been an increasing interest in how to take a better look at the justice system, particularly the outcomes from that system. The prosecuting attorney said that a data-driven approach can provide a drone-like perspective that “allows us to kind of go up and see the landscape better and look at the system from a different point of view.”
Tunheim cautioned those in attendance to not consider this new data dashboard as “an answer to everything,” saying that it should generate more questions than answers.
“This is really the beginning, in my view,” Tunheim said.
The prosecutor said the project is a little over three years in the making. His office applied for and received grant funding through the Dept. of Justice’s Smart Prosecution: Innovative Prosecution Solutions (ISP) Program.
Another impetus for the project, according to Tunheim, was the desire to have an updated, robust case management system that could be used by both prosecutors and public defenders for discovery purposes.
Measures for Justice is a nonpartisan organization that works with communities, courts, prosecutors and police in an effort to standardize and improve criminal justice data nationwide, which incudes the Commons tool developed in partnership with the Thurston County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office.
Kianna Ruff, a senior civic impact manager for Measures for Justice, spoke about the non-profit’s vision for transparency.
“When we think about transparency, we think about volunteering information, creating spaces like this for people to ask questions, to help everybody as a community to grow,” Ruff said. “And so, the point of the dashboard is to really just give trust, but also dialogue, to spark dialogue, to ask hard questions.”
Ruff thanked the seven-member Thurston County Community Advisor Board (CAB) for helping to ensure the information in the dashboard is understandable and digestible.
Tara Tsehlana and Alexis Cota of the prosecutor’s office added that the CAB’s curiosity included thoughtful questions about how the office collected data on things like race and diversions. These questions led to the office making meaningful changes in its data collection processes.
Lauren Knoth-Peterson is a member of the CAB and serves as an expert in criminal justice data, research and policy for the state of Washington. She said she was most excited that the prosecuting attorney’s office willingly and voluntarily decided to develop these dashboards on their own.
“I really, truly believe that if agencies aren’t willing to develop these types of dashboards, someone else will do it for them,” Knoth-Peterson said. “What I appreciate is that these dashboards are developed by the county in collaboration with the community… not some outside organization or a third-party corporation that doesn’t have a real vested interest in our community. No one knows or understands Thurston County data better than those who live and work right here in the county.”
Knoth-Peterson added that she hopes the dashboard enhances the conversations, debates and policy work that already exist across the county.
“These dashboards give members of the public the ability to openly examine and critique the prosecutor’s office and their operations, and they have been so receptive to those criticisms and those concerns,” Knoth-Peterson said.
Dominic Testino, senior research associate at Measures for Justice, led a demo of Commons for those in attendance, which included county commissioners and members of the community advisory board.
Commons tracks prosecution measures for adult felony cases, with tools that include: a policy goal tracker; monthly, quarterly and yearly trend data; contextual information about the jurisdiction; caseflow data; filters for comparing data by demographics; and a way to share data with policymakers and media.
Moreover, the Thurston County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office and its CAB have created a shared policy goal of reducing the amount of time from arraignment to case closure by 15 days, from 152 to 137 days. Commons allows users to easily track the office’s progress with this goal.
To learn more about Commons and explore the Commons data dashboard, visit
https://www.thurstoncountywa.gov/departments/prosecuting-attorney/data-dashboard.
