Pubdate: Fri, 22 Feb 2008 Source: Asheville Citizen-Times (NC) Copyright: 2008 Asheville Citizen-Times Contact: http://www.citizen-times.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/863 N.C.'S LOOMING PRISON CRISIS REQUIRES A MEASURED RESPONSE North Carolina, having dealt with a prison crisis for nearly two decades, is in the process of finishing a prison-building boom. And now faces another prison crisis. We trust this one will be dealt with like the last one: With common sense and an eye on the burden to taxpayers. Prison system projections, which historically have a high degree of accuracy, show the system will run beyond capacity for the foreseeable future and will be 6,000 beds short by 2017. Solutions to that problem should include a hard look at sentences for nonviolent offenders, a bit of self-restraint in the General Assembly to push laws that make legislators look tough on crime but add only extra burden to the justice system and yes, more prisons. We'll never reach a utopian paradise where there is no need for prisons. There will always be people who cannot function in society without harming others. Advertisement Logic, not emotion However, the impulse toward volume of justice, not quality of justice, should be avoided. There's an old saying that when your only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. Prisons should not become the hammer of our day, a dumping ground for not just dangerous criminals but petty criminals as well. If North Carolina's track record holds, that temptation will be avoided. Facing a similar crunch nearly two decades ago, The Sentencing and Policy Advisory Commission Act of 1990 set up a group to examine the state's practices. It was able to help formulate recommendations that led to longer terms for felony offenders, a closer relationship between sentences given and time served and alternative punishment for those who didn't need to be incarcerated. Along the way, crime rates dropped 21 percent from 1995 to 2004, and violent crime dropped 31 percent. While it's worth noting that those numbers mirrored national trends and can be attributed to a number of factors, it's also worth noting that if North Carolina's reforms had not taken place, the prison population today would be 54,000 or more instead of the current 39,000. At an average cost of around $25,000 a year, that's a considerable savings to taxpayers. Additional savings are obvious when looking at the cost of prisons -- $28 million for a 500-bed minimum security prison, $63 million for a 500-bed medium-security prison and $90 million for a 1,000-bed maximum security facility. Burgeoning population Sheer demographics alone may be cause for new prison construction. North Carolina had 6.63 million citizens in 1990, and is now closing in on 10 million. The likelihood of all the new additions being model citizens is, shall we say, remote. Additional prison beds will almost certainly be necessary. But this shouldn't be a growth industry. Lawmakers pushing popular new laws against crimes like child pornography or gang activity need to eye where pressure could be relieved on the system. That may call for a hard look at drug laws, which have caused a shocking jump in incarceration in this nation over the last three decades. Prior to 1980, the U.S. prison population had held generally steady for around 50 years. Law-and-order one-upmanship in the political arena resulted in punitive new laws, particularly regarding drugs, that caused the prison population to double in the 1980s and again in the 1990s and continue to grow this decade. As a result, America, with 5 percent of the world's population, has a quarter of its inmates. As the drug war cruises along on autopilot, more people are now arrested on marijuana charges alone annually in the U.S. than arrested for all crimes in Western Europe. In an effort to protect society, lasting damage may have been done to large segments of society. It's not coincidental that in 1980 there were 463,000 African-American males in college and 143,000 in prison, whereas by 2000 those numbers were flipped, with 603,000 in college and nearly 800,000 in prison. And it's not coincidental that nearly one in 30 Americans is now in prison or jail or on probation or parole. In dealing with the current prison crisis, we need a careful examination of current laws to ensure we're not planting the seeds of the next prison crisis. In an era when agencies across the board, from education to mental health to services for the young and elderly, are competing for scarce taxpayer dollars, we need to make sure those dollars are spent wisely. That applies to prisons and the justice system as it does everything else. We hope North Carolina will show the same common sense it has in the past in dealing with this issue. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek