Prisons and schools
No bookcase.
By Tim Redmond
Here's one of the saddest statistics I've seen in a long time: California will soon spend more money on prisons than on its university system.
Everyone in Sacramento seems to agree this is wrong. Nobody does a damn thing about it.
In fact, the state Legislature just agreed to spend another $8 billion on more prison beds.
More on this tomorrow.
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Comments (1)
Which of two real choices would you select to eliminate the 16,600 prison bed shortfall?
1. Spend $6.2 billion to build 40,000 prison beds and commit to spending an additional $1.4 billion in annual operating costs for the next 30 to 40 years? or
2. revise the work time credit system , providing immediate overcrowding relief, and reducing annual prison operating costs by about $.5 billion?
Doesn’t appear to be a real tough choice and unfortunately it was not.
It is not only unfortunate but it is going to cost a lot of money. Choice number 2 was selected by our governor and legislators with almost no debate. It’s a done deal and will move quickly forward. The construction package is not part of the annual state budget (which is out of balance) but financed by long term bonds. It is probably assumed that taxpayers, and their children, will hardly even realize they are paying for it! And our leaders are probably correct on that point.
Posted by Rich McKone | May 23, 2007 05:08 PM