A Governor, who once pledged to "blow up the boxes" of state government, is too politically timid to even begin to deal with a routine prison bed shortfall of 16,600 beds. Other administrations easily dealt with correctional bed shortages; county sheriffs deal with it every day. Sheriffs release about 20,000 inmates a few days early each month. Governor Reagan dealt with overcrowding by reducing average length of stay by a few days (and closing a prison) without significant problems[1].

Instead of simply dealing with prison overcrowding by bringing prison capacity into line with demand, our famous Governor caved in to public employee unions and opted to literally waste $6.5 billion for 40,000 unneeded prison beds. It will take years to bring the new beds on line and will result in a 32,000 prison bed surplus by 2012 according to the Legislative Analysist[2].

How difficult would it be for our famous and timid Governor to actually deal with overcrowding on a rational basis? How about a couple 10 minute phone calls? He could call the chairman of the Board of Prison Terms and tell him or her to reduce average revocation terms for technical parole violations. Reducing terms by 30 days saves 5,900 prison beds and 60 days saves 11,700 beds. He could also phone the Director of Corrections (& Rehabilitation) and tell him to adjust the inmate work incentive program[3] to reduce average days served in prison by 8%, from 587 days to 543 days. The 16,600 prison bed shortage would be eliminated[4] and annual prison operating costs reduced by about $450 million.  It also avoids spending any of the $6.5 billion slated for more prison beds.

It should be noted that overcrowding has nothing to do with inmates serving long terms for major crimes. There is plenty of room for all such offenders - none will ever be released due to overcrowding. The prison bed shortage exists only because thousands of less serious offenders (often referred to as wobblers) and parole violators, serving terms of less than a year, have been diverted to prison due to the long term, severe county jail bed shortage. Basic correctional policy dictates that short term offenders, absent other factors - usually security, serve their terms in county jail (at far less cost) not prison[5]. These short term offenders occupy about 30,000 to 40,000 prison beds, causing overcrowding[6].

Problem solved and our timid Governor can focus on real issues like the State budget.

Hey, Gov! Find the nerve!

Rich McKone, Executive Officer, California Coalition on Corrections, www.rebuildcorrections.lincal.com; Parole Agent III, Retired, DC&R, Former Criminal Justice Planner, California Council on Criminal Justice & California Youth Authority

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[1] There is no relationship between LOS and offender behavior after release See Recidivism: The Effect of Incarceration and Length of Time Served, Song & Lieb, September 1993 for a listing of 12 studies on LOS and parole outcome at: http://www.wsipp.wa.gov/rptfiles/IncarcRecid.pdf.

[2]  http://www.lao.ca.gov/analysis_2007/crim_justice/cj_05_anl07.aspx#Adult%20Corrections  

[3] See Penal Code Section 2930-2935 for work/good time credits.

[4] Inmates, on average, serve about 600 days in prison with each average day equaling about 360 beds.

[5]  Historically, there has been a 50%/50% state local offender split.  Due to the county bed shortage, it is now about a 67%state/33%county split.