Pubdate: Mon, 10 Sep 2007
Source: Express-Times, The (PA)
Copyright: 2007 The Express-Times
Contact:  http://www.pennlive.com/expresstimes/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1489
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/rehab.htm (Treatment)

BURSTING AT THE SEAMS

As Corrections Spending Balloons, Officials Look At Alternatives To 
Locking Up Nonviolent Offenders

Overlooked amid the discussion of the state's dire transportation 
needs and pressing issues on the health care and energy fronts is 
that spending on corrections is bursting at the seams.

Corrections is the third largest expenditure in the state budget, 
after education and public welfare. Taxpayers are footing the $500 
million bill for three new prisons that will be filled in less than 
five years, given current inmate population trends.

That's on top of state prisons operating at 110.4 percent of capacity 
as of July 31, according to the Department of Corrections. State 
budget projections are that each of the 45,625 inmates will cost 
taxpayers $34,012 to house this fiscal year, plus $4,497 per inmate 
for health care.

It's not much better on the county level, most of which are operating 
close to capacity. Just ask the Cumberland County commissioners, who 
are looking at possibly having to raise taxes to pay for a $31 
million expansion of a prison that was just built in 1985.

Many of these inmates, particularly those in state prisons, are doing 
hard time for violent crimes and sex offenses, and deservedly so. But 
there are also large numbers of nonviolent offenders caught up in the 
now three-decades-old War on Drugs or who encountered elected 
officials and judges who ran for office on get-tough-on-crime platforms.

That philosophy appears to be changing. What have amounted to 
patchwork attempts at alternative sentencing and early release 
programs for those committing nonviolent crimes are being joined on a 
statewide level.

Gov. Ed Rendell is advocating sentencing reforms and has picked up 
support from key lawmakers of both parties, district attorneys and 
county commissioners. The proposals discussed so far include a heavy 
emphasis on drug and alcohol treatment or other rehabilitation 
programs to make some inmates with good behavior eligible for early 
release, or allowing other people to avoid conventional prison terms 
altogether.

One variation is so-called "intermediate punishment," in which a 
nonviolent offender would receive rehabilitation treatment while in 
prison and progress to less secure settings closer to their homes.

Some of this is unlikely to sit well with those with a tough 
law-and-order philosophy, who believe the threat of jail time is the 
only real deterrent. But the inmate statistics in state and county 
prisons suggest otherwise.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom