Prosecutors' offices must have the capacity to effectively and efficiently fulfill their ethical obligations. Performance indicators centered on the goals of Capacity and Efficiency assess whether the Office has the staffing/resources it needs, prioritizes cases in a way to make efficient and effective use of those resources, and resolves cases in a timely manner.
What kinds of questions can we ask? We can think about this as answering a few questions: Is the Office staffed the way we want it staffed? Are we making decisions effectively, by dismissing bad cases or diverting the appropriate cases? Are we making decisions efficiently within appropriate timelines and by prioritizing the right cases?
Some cases involve more serious offenses and greater risk to public safety. This chart shows how often more serious cases (felonies) are filed compared to less serious ones (misdemeanors).
Reserving incarceration for individuals who pose the greatest public safety risk ensures that limited correctional resources are used where they have the most impact, while maintaining accountability and reducing unnecessary costs to taxpayers and the community. This chart shows the proportion of all incarceration sentences that were issued for a felony (rather than a misdemeanor) conviction.
This chart shows how many days it takes for cases to be completed from start to finish (from filing to disposition).
In some cases, all criminal charges are dismissed after the case is filed, either by the court or by the prosecutor. This chart shows how quickly those cases are dismissed. (Note - annual average and median time to dismissal was capped at 1,000 days for display purposes.)