“Low-hanging fruit” or “blood out of a turnip”? As tax revenue slows, lawmakers in Alabama and across the United States may turn to court costs.
Sluggish tax collections could set the stage nationally for new hikes in court costs, fines, and fees. That’s according to a recent article by The Pew Charitable Trusts, which observes that “many of the fiscal conditions that in recent decades led to this heavy reliance on fines and fees—federal retrenchment, slowing state tax revenue, and […]
Joint Interim Court Cost Study Commission Recommends Standardization, Transparency, and Reform to “Patchwork” System of Fees
For over a decade, PARCA has documented the role of court costs as they exist at the intersection of public finance and public safety, sometimes providing the only analysis of this important source of revenue. In a report sent to lawmakers earlier this week, Chief Justice Sarah Stewart writes that Alabama lawmakers should standardize court […]
SNAP Error is Not SNAP Fraud
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as the Food Stamp Program, helps people with low incomes buy food. In FY2025, approximately 740,300 Alabamians, or about 14.3% of the population, received SNAP benefits. These figures include 300,000 children. Recipients receive an average of $6.31 per day. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s latest report indicates […]
Special Congressional Primary Continues Trend of Declining Political Participation in Alabama
Use the tabs to move between different views of the data and use the menus to focus in on the systems, schools, or subjects that you are most interested in. Only 5% of registered voters in the Alabama Congressional Districts holding elections last week cast ballots, producing one of the state’s lowest federal election turnout […]
Local Court Fee Increases Associated with Increased Jail Detention, New Research Finds
New research led by the Public Affairs Research Council of Alabama (PARCA) and MDRC indicates that each additional $100 in cumulative court fees for criminal cases is associated with an additional 34 jail detentions per 100,000 people at the county level. This small but significant increase suggests that fee increases could increase detention rather than deter it. […]
Primary Election: Proposed Statewide Amendments Analysis
Beyond the Democratic and Republican primary elections scheduled for May 19, voters will decide the fate of two statewide amendments to the Alabama Constitution. One would prevent local district attorneys’ salaries from being reduced during an elected term of office. Another would give judges discretion to deny bail to people charged with certain crimes. Those […]
Drop in International Migration Slows Net Population Growth in Most Alabama Counties
Use the tabs to move between different views of the data and use the menus to focus in on the systems, schools, or subjects that you are most interested in. Decreasing immigration from abroad slowed population growth across Alabama’s counties in 2024 and 2025, though suburban counties and growth magnets in north and south Alabama […]
Keys to Success in College and Career Readiness
This spring, all Alabama high school graduates will have to earn a marker of college and/or career readiness in order to graduate.1 In this installment of PARCA’s Keys to Success series, we visit Opp High School, which has been one of the state’s most successful schools at producing college and career-ready graduates. In fact, for […]
PARCA Partners with VOICES on the 2025 Alabama Kids Count Data Book
VOICES for Alabama’s Children published the 2025 Alabama Kids Count Data Book yesterday. For the 10th year in a row, PARCA worked with VOICES as a data partner for the project. Since 1994, the Alabama Kids Count Data Book has documented and tracked the health, education, safety, and economic security of children at the state and county levels. […]
How Alabama Taxes Compare, 2025
Each year, PARCA uses data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Annual Survey of State and Local Finances to compare Alabama’s tax collections with those of all 50 states. The most recent data are from fiscal year 2023.