The sentence was introduced in 1981. The first study describes 1,534 offenders sentenced to community service between February 1981 and October 1982. It also discusses their offenses, the sentence lengths, and the use of additional sentences. The second study reports the views of district court judges, probation officers, offenders sentenced to community service, and community sponsors who supervise offenders. All the groups interviewed had favorable views of community service orders. The third study discusses the validity of the use of recidivism measures as indicators of the effectiveness of sanctions. It compares 419 persons given community service sentences with 459 people sentenced to intermittent detention during the same time period. For people with the same likelihood, prior to sentencing, of committing another offense, the kind of sentence appears to make no difference in reconviction rates. These rates depend largely on other factors. data tables and figures are provided. Three appendixes include seriousness ratings used for offenses, survey instruments, and results of reconviction analysis of the samples.