By The Center for Michigan - August 29, 2007
There's plenty of agreement among conservatives, liberals and moderates alike that Michigan's prison costs are unsustainable. Gov. Jennifer Granholm wants to release non-violent prisoners and reduce sentences. Republican leaders want to keep those doors locked on all those prisoners but otherwise find efficiencies in the system. The guv says her plan will save $122 million. The Republicans say their plan will save $200 million. The guv's plan doesn't sit well with the tough-on-crime crowds. The GOP plan won't sit well with the guv's supporters in labor. How 'bout if both sides swallow hard, accept each other's reforms, and then cut some more. Instituting both of those reform packages only gets us one-sixth of the way to a solution for the $1.8 billion state budget deficit.
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"Michigan’s incarceration rate is 40 percent higher than that of its Great Lakes neighbors, resulting in $500 million annually in higher costs." We are also one of the few states to impose Truth in sentancing, for all prisoners, regardless of the crime.
Is there any indication that any of this is solving our drug and crime problems?
If we are to be honest with ourselves as a society, crimes deserve punishment that's why laws are established. Silly laws, silly crimes? Yes. Serious laws, serious crimes? Certainly. If the Department of Corrections believes that serious rehabilitation is going to come at the hands of The Salvation Army then let us pray. Over a half a century ago the country determined there was a need to change from a penal system to a correctional system. Why was that? It was because there was a strong belief that you could not just send a criminal to an institution for punishment rather that the criminal was sent as punishment. Whatever portion of rehabilitation ever came with the reform from a penal system to a correctional system has seemed to disappear and is now being burdened back on society.
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