One way to control Michigan's spiraling prison costs would to put control of prison beds and prisoner parole, in local hands, Grand Traverse County Circuit Judge Tom Power, a former state representative, argues in this guest column...

MANAGING PRISON POPULATION WITHIN A SET CAPACITY

Prison population is now determined by the 57 circuit courts that sentence prisoners to the prison system and, perhaps more importantly, by an appointed state parole board which controls who leaves the prison system. The state must make available the number of prison beds required by these decisions. I suggest we allow each circuit court a set number of beds, give that court parole responsibility for its prisoners, and thereby put the responsibility for prison utilization and the need to control utilization in the same hands.

The number of beds to be provided by the Michigan Department of Corrections would be determined by the legislature and the governor through the appropriations process. These beds would be distributed among the 57 circuit courts with each court having a set percent of the prison beds available.

Presently, circuit judges determine, within the limits provided by law, who goes to prison. Under this proposal, each circuit court would establish a parole board to make parole decisions about prisoners sentenced from that circuit. Each circuit court would then control the utilization of its allocated prison beds.

If a circuit court fails to conform utilization to the beds available, a mandatory release of that circuit court’s prisoners would occur. Models for such an early release program could include the early release law that applied to the prison system until it was abandoned during the Blanchard Administration or it could be patterned after the early release provisions of the present jail over-crowding law. An alternative would be a financial penalty imposed against the court or its funding units for each bed the circuit is over capacity.

Circuit courts and their funding units could loan or sell beds to one another.

Among the issues which may need to be addressed would be prisoners serving mandatory life sentences. The judges and parole board have no discretion. Should these prisoners be “counted” against the bed allocation of that sentencing circuit?

How will beds be allocated among judges in a multi-judge circuit? One can easily conceive of some judges wanting to use more beds than others and the total exceeding the allocation to that circuit. These are political problems best handled at the local level. If moral suasion and policy arguments do not control a judge who makes excessive use of the prison beds, perhaps the Chief Judge of the circuit should be empowered to control utilization by his or her fellow judges. The Chief Judge of each circuit is now appointed by the Michigan Supreme Court.

The most important and politically most explosive problem would be how to allocate beds among the various circuits. Allocation of beds proportionate to population is the most obvious method. But circuits with a history of higher crime will argue they should receive more beds than their population would warrant. In addition to population, beds could be allocated based on historic prison use or number of felonies reported to the police. The allocation of prison beds among the various local circuit courts is an important policy and political issue.

There is much talk about reducing the budget of the Department of Corrections. It is pointed out that Michigan ’s prison capacity went from something over 10,000 beds in the early 1980’s to over 50,000 now. This was a bipartisan expansion commenced during Governor Blanchard’s Administration, kicked off with great fan-fare during a State of the State address, and continued during the Engler years. While it has been popular in some quarters to blame sentencing practices, a recent study found that there are 17,000 prisoners held in the prison system beyond their first parole eligibility date. In other words, a very substantial share of those 50,000 beds are occupied by people who were eligible for parole and were denied by a parole board which is controlled by the executive branch. This and other evidence indicates the expansion in prison use of the last two decades may be due more to toughened parole standards than to sentencing practices.

This proposal would provide a way to reduce prison capacity in an orderly manner. If instead of 50,000 beds, the Legislature and Governor were to establish 45,000 beds or 40,000 beds as the amount the State would fund, that amount would be allocated among the circuit courts who would then be responsible for living within the allocated number of prison beds.

The key to this proposal is placing in one set of hands power to determine prison utilization and the duty to live within a specific number of beds.

Thomas G. Power
Circuit Court Judge 1993 – present
Michigan House of Representatives 1983 – 1992