RESEARCH ARTICLE ASSESSING THE EARNED DISCHARGE PILOT PROJECT Assessing the earned discharge pilot project: The Importance of Context, Capacity, and Content Sarah M. Smith Marisa K. Omori Susan F. Turner University of California, Irvine Jesse Jannetta Urban Institute L argely as a result of punitive measures passed in the 1980s and 1990s, the United States has experienced a dramatic increase in prison populations over the past three decades. Parole populations also have soared, stressing the level of supervision and resources parole agents can provide to parolees. California, where prison overcrowding has resulted in a court order stipulating a reduction of tens of thousands of inmates, might be the state most impacted by these trends. California’s correctional system is plagued by what many experts call a “counterproductive” parole system that causes growth to the prison population (Coleman v. Schwarzenegger , 2009: 181), and recent statewide budget deficits have resulted in reduced funds to corrections, exacerbating the problems faced by the state’s prison and parole agencies (Coleman v. Schwarzenegger , 2009; Dickey, 1996). California’s parole system, managed by the Division of Parole Operations (DAPO) within the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), is unique from other states in several ways. Nearly all inmates released from California prisons are placed under mandatory parole supervision for 3 years regardless of their crime, individual needs, and risk (Petersilia, 2007b; Petersilia and Weisberg, 2006; Travis and Lawrence, This research was supported in part by the Center for Evidence-Based Corrections contract with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. We thank staff from the Division of Adult Parole Operations and the Adult Research Branch for their support. We also would like to acknowledge Heather Schoenfeld and three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. Sarah M. Smith and Marisa K. Omori contributed equally to this article. Direct correspondence to Sarah M. Smith, Department of Criminology, Law & Society, University of California, Irvine, 2340 Social Ecology II, Irvine, CA 92697 (e-mail: sarahms@uci.edu). DOI:10.1111/j.1745-9133.2012.00817.x C  2012 American Society of Criminology 385 Criminology & Public Policy  Volume 11  Issue 2