Talking Re-entry (or The Turd in the Punchbowl, Part 2)

Governor McDonnell delivered his “State of the Commonwealth” speech last week to both Houses of the Virginia General Assembly.  As with any political speech, the Governor lacked specifics and spent the vast majority of his words on applauding his own efforts to solve the problems of the Commonwealth, problems that coincidentally haven’t lessoned on his watch.

I dare say, a higher percentage of residents inside our “learning community” watched the Governor’s address than the law-abiding, taxpaying residents outside the wire.  Maybe it’s because we know that just a few words during the speech could make all the difference for the vast majority of us living inside here.  Will he mention earned good time, early release or even – dare I say it – parole?  We watched. 

So we listened, listened as he calls on the delegates to strengthen the Virginia Retirement System, without mentioning his own hand in increasing the funding deficit.  We listen as he calls for more funding for schools and slowing the growth of tuition increases in state colleges and universities all the while knowing he’s willing to continue supporting a prison system that saps over $1 billion annually to hold 40,000 inmates, the majority of whom are nonviolent and low custody offenders, and continues to support and encourage a prison industry system which overcharges state schools and agencies for their products.

We wait and we listen, listen for mention of “corrections”.  And then it comes and we all see the turd in the punchbowl yet again.  Not one word about the absolutely criminal state of Virginia’s prisons.  Not one word about the abysmal 400% growth in inmate population in the last fifteen years or even higher spending increase given DOC over the same fifteen year period so that today one of every eight general fund dollars, $1,133,000,000 in 2013, will be spent on the state’s largest bureaucracy:  DOC and its 13,000 plus employees.

No, instead he said money must be given to cover the expenses necessary to help offenders “re-enter society”.  After all, he noted, “over ninety percent of the incarcerated will be released…”  Throw in a few fibs:  “our program is working.  Crime rates and recidivism are down…” and Governor McDonnell moved on to his next “great” initiative.  And the guys in the building?  They just sat there wondering how anyone with a lick of sense can keep buying the same b.s.

Here’s what the Governor didn’t tell you:  every state is facing a significant financial crisis.  The world economy is in trouble.  The US deficit is now the size of the total economy – meaning cuts must be made.  Friends, we aren’t Greece, not yet anyway.  But we’re headed that way.  There’s less money and state government must get smart with its spending.  Keeping 40,000 men and women locked up is neither smart, nor economically sustainable.  That’s the turd in the punchbowl.  So far, no politician has come forward with the guts to admit it.

As mentioned above, Virginia isn’t alone.  A few weeks ago Kentucky released 1,000 inmates.  Last year Kentucky (and six other states) revamped its sentencing laws to utilize alternatives to prison for most non-violent felons.  And then there’s Oregon.

Oregon is facing a $3.5 billion shortfall in their 2011-13 biennial budgets.  The former Governor (the current Governor also signed on) issued an executive order to re-evaluate “who is sent to prison and for how long”. 

Oregon had to face the realities of a “tough on crime”, versus “smart on crime” approach to incarceration.  Compare their numbers to the abysmal results in Virginia:

-        Since 1987 Oregon DOC expenditures increased 209%.

-        Oregon DOC’s two year budget is $1.36 billion.

-        Oregon’s DOC spending accounts for 53% of its public safety spending and one out of every ten general fund dollars.

-        In the last 20 years, Oregon has doubled the number behind bars, even while the crime rate went down.  Why?  Because of increased sentence length and decreased good time earning.

And to think, Virginia’s numbers are even worse.

But Oregon’s Governor has political courage.  He asked the voters of the state “Have we more than doubled our investment in students over the same period?  Not even close.”  He went on:  “Our long term goal is to invest in people not prisons…”  He vowed to spend resources in a way that keeps dangerous people locked up.  But then said this:

“We have a real dichotomy…locking up more people versus providing our children with a better education.  There is a great imbalance between how we invest in incarceration and how we invest in education…It’s not fair.  And, most of all, it’s not smart.”

And what has Oregon’s experiment with a creative early release program that rewards inmates who actively work to better themselves shown?  As the outgoing Governor noted “reduced prison sentences or alternatives to incarceration are likely to produce the greatest potential public safety cost savings.”

Powerful words, courageous words, words Governor McDonnell should have used in his state of the Commonwealth address.  See, there are politicians who are willing to do the tough work and speak the truth.  Virginia, it appears, isn’t fortunate to have that kind of politician.

Ironically, Bob McDonnell has based his entire criminal justice program on offender re-entry.  The problem is, “imprisonment significantly reduces the ability of ex-offenders to find jobs, costing the US economy an estimated $57 to $65 billion annually in lost economic output.”  That was the finding of a November 2010 Center for Policy Research study.  Re-entry programs aren’t the answer; sending less people to prison is.

And that is the turd in Governor McDonnell’s plans for DOC.  Its high time he or some other Virginia politician – clean up the bowl.

The Cost of Doing Nothing

I watched with mixed emotions as the country went through the seizures of defaulting on the national debt.  Part of me was deeply amused.  Every cable news outlet had their “breaking news” and a countdown clock to debt Armageddon.  Both parties – and the president as well – played simple, false sound bites.  The “Tea Party” pushed demagoguery to a new limit.  Ah America, “God shed His grace on thee.”  And Virginia’s Governor?  He did more creative bookkeeping than I did to land myself in prison.

Governor McDonnell touted a $500 million surplus, except, he forgot to tell people he failed to meet the payment requirements to the Virginia Retirement System.  There is no surplus.  VRS is almost $17 billion underfunded and the Commonwealth still has an IOU outstanding to VRS for the prior year’s budget debacle.  And McDonnell has the brass set to go on CNN as a “possible VP” nominee and tout Virginia’s economic well-being.

A pox on both their houses!  As “The Economist” noted in an OpEd piece on March 19, 2011: 

“…despite all the rhetoric from the tea partiers, big government is not just the fault of the self-interested bureaucrats and leftist politicians.  Conservative voters…have kept on demanding the state do more…the right has built prisons, announced wars on drugs and terror, and indulged generals, farmers, and policemen…”

What we have seen in the recent economic unraveling is that everything costs.  And the bill for America’s love affair with “tough on crime” mass incarceration policy has come due.  Governor McDonnell can lead or he can step aside.  But, the time for change is now.

As states such as Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Kentucky have realized, there are more effective and less expensive ways to handle most non-violent offenders.  These states are employing alternatives to sending someone convicted of a crime to prison.  They utilize home incarceration and day center reporting versus prison.

This isn’t a “bleeding heart liberal” approach.  Conservatives such as former Reagan Attorney General Ed Meese, drug czar William Bennett, Newt Gingrich and anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist are pushing for prison reform.

Where is Virginia in this discussion?  Not even involved.  Virginia will spend $25,000 to keep me housed in a low level facility this year and the costs continue to climb.  I am unable to pay restitution for my embezzlement while in here; I do not pay taxes; I do not help raise my youngest son.  Three years I’ve spent behind bars.  If Bob McDonnell was really the politician he claims to be, he’d look at my situation and the thousands like it.  He’d let us “do our time” outside the walls; working, making restitution, being productive citizens.

As the "Sentencing Project" reported recently, lawmakers in Kansas, Michigan, New Jersey and New York adopted significant policy changes to reduce prison populations.

“In each of these state a range of policy changes were adopted, including sentencing reforms, alternatives for ‘prison-bound’ people, reducing time served in prison, addressing parole release rates and reducing revocations”

23 states have made significant changes in the way sentences are handed out and the length of time an inmate serves – Virginia is not one of those 23.

Bob McDonnell and the Virginia General Assembly can make a difference.  $1 billion a year to house 40,000 inmates is enough reason to try.  They need to enact a real “earned good time credit” system that aggressively rewards inmates who seek to change and improve.  Early release should not just be a goal, but the mission of corrections.

Virginia can no longer afford to do nothing.  Virginia needs real solutions, not “creative” accounting.  The economic realities that showed their true colors this summer prove that government must make smart choices.  No longer can the U.S. with 5 percent of the world’s population, keep 25 percent of the world’s inmates behind bars.

Perhaps Governor McDonnell will finally get it.