Methodology

How money figures are separated

Appropriations, obligations, outlays, current award value, potential value and guaranteed minimums answer different questions and are never merged.

Six money words that are not synonyms

Each answers a different question. They are displayed beside each other and never merged into a single headline number.

Appropriation: Money appropriated by Congress. Authority to spend, not a commitment to any recipient.
Obligation: Money legally committed under an award.
Outlay: Money actually paid out.
Current award value: What the award is worth as modified to date. It moves when a modification posts.
Potential value: The ceiling if every option and extension is exercised. A ceiling is not a plan and not a forecast.
Guaranteed minimum: A contractual floor a contract states the government will pay for, expressed in beds or dollars. It is not a population count and not evidence of how many people were held.

What is never added to what

A base award and its modifications are shown as a sequence, not silently rolled into one number.
Current period figures are never presented as lifetime totals.
Award data is never presented as company revenue.
A direct recipient's award is never merged with an affiliate's or a subcontractor's.
Political-finance and lobbying money is never added to award, obligation, or outlay totals.
A figure the source did not report reads as not reported, never as zero.

Beds, capacity and average daily population

Money figures and population figures are separate evidence, and one is never used to estimate the other.

A contract's guaranteed minimum states what the government agreed to pay for. It does not establish how many people were detained at a facility, and it is never converted into a population figure.

Facility population and capacity are published only where a primary source states them, with that source's own window and as-of date attached. Where no source states a figure, the field reads as not established rather than being derived from a bed floor, a contract line, or a neighbouring facility.

Average daily population is a reported average over a stated period. It is not a snapshot count, not a capacity, and not interchangeable with a bed floor.

What the money ledger covers

The records indexed here are federal awards selected for documentation quality, not a census of detention spending. Sub-awards, intergovernmental service agreements, and county pass-throughs are largely absent.

Award figures change as modifications post. What is published is a snapshot with a retrieval date, not a live feed, and the snapshot date is shown beside the figure.

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Where these distinctions are visible

Each award row on the award ledger keeps obligation, outlay, current value and potential value apart, and every receipt states what its figures do and do not establish.

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Rest of the method

This page is one part of the published method. The reader guide summarises all of it, and corrections are recorded on the affected record with the date applied.