Demonstrating a level of responsibility lower than that of a teenage mother who leaves an infant on the steps of a church, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation will soon be depositing unsupervised felons in neighborhoods near you.
As part of an unrelenting effort to reduce criminal sentences, eliminate parole supervision and shift its responsibilities to county law enforcement, Corrections will today commence granting early release credits (without any requirement that they be earned) and designate tens of thousands of inmates for release without parole supervision.
The unsupervised release of prisoners also absolves Corrections from any responsibility to provide parolees with training or medical care or even bus passes. From the myopic perspective of Corrections, ignoring parolees saves money. Yet ignoring offenders who have the greatest rehabilitation potential simply increases the likelihood they will fail.
Indeed, this very administration abandoned its prior policy of ignoring parole violations in 2005 when the Sacramento Bee published an in-depth article that documented a dramatic increase of new felonies among parolees whose parole violations were ignored.
In a similar vein, the Los Angeles Times documented that early release of inmates has high human costs in the May 14, 2006 story: "Releasing Inmates Early Has a Costly Human Toll."
Sadly, Corrections’ ill-conceived policies will increase crime without achieving cost savings.
January 25th, 2010 at 12:00 am
Perhaps you will vote for revenue increases to pay for the measures you’ve sponsored that are costing the state millions of dollars — legislation with any revenues to pay for.
I dont want these folks on the street either, but costs the state money to keep them in jail and unfortunately you dont vote for the funds to do that.
No one to blame but yourself, Senator.
January 26th, 2010 at 12:00 am
Maybe if CARB stopped putting petty criminals who have under inflated tires in jail maybe we’d have more beds for the prisoners.
I guess the mission for the senator is to figure out what to cut to pay for the transition programs for the parolees since most Republicans signed the ATR No new taxes pledge.
January 28th, 2010 at 12:00 am
how about by laying off every new state hire since 2003? Or do some work and lay off the tens of thousands of middle management cubicle dwelling state employees who don’t actually perform any useful service to anybody but the SEIU and themselves.