Public-private partnerships are an innovative approach to corrections and treatment management that have produced an outstanding record of cost savings while maintaining or exceeding quality and accountability levels expected by public agencies. In many cases, private correctional services and facilities provide a catalyst for reforms that reduce costs and provide better correctional solutions.

Public-private partnerships are not new and they are not unique to the corrections system. Over the last fifty years there has been a strong trend toward privately contracting services. Water agencies rely on private contractors to deliver clean and dependable water supplies. Private and not-for-profit clinics provide an essential role in meeting community healthcare needs. Private schools and curriculum offer a complement to public education from the pre-kindergarten to post-graduate level. Correctional services are no exception to this trend.

In recent years, the value of the public-private partnerships has become increasingly clear to correctional officials and government agencies. Prison populations are swelling (500,000 inmates will be added to federal, state, and county facilities over the next five years), leading to overcrowding and significant cost overruns. Research demonstrates the states that utilized private prisons had considerably more success in keeping public corrections spending under control than states with no private prisons. Today, three-fifths of all U.S. states contract with private corporations to house a portion of their state prisoners, and the number of states grows every year.

While it is commonly known that privatization saves money, many people do not realize that privatization significantly improves the quality of corrections and treatment services.

By opening the corrections and treatment industries to competitive bidding, all the costs in the corrections system are more closely constrained, and both private contractor and public operators are spurred to improve quality, flexibility, and accountability for the services that they deliver.

Private-public partnerships are also focused on reducing recidivism. Private contractors offer a wide range of rehabilitative services including education, vocational training, and substance abuse programs so support reintegration into society and to prevent people from returning to the correctional systems. The focus on rehabilitation in the correctional setting positively affects offender re-integration into society, thereby reducing re-incarceration rate and the expense burden on the corrections system.