Comments on: Three things every citizen should know about state prisons

By: Inthemiddle

Inthemiddle — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:12:09 +0000

How about this …… everyone who has a great idea on how to improve a prison go work in one or be an inmate for awhile. You have no idea how impractical your ideas are. Gardening sounds wonderful! Now how do you get a guy with a gang mentality, drug addiction and a shank to weed the lettuce? Or keep him from stabbing the guy who is bent over to pull a weed? Do you even know that the best jobs (kitchen work) are controlled by the gangs. If a white guy gets assigned to the kitchen he gets his azz beat or gets set up so the position is opened back up to another black gang member. You all think it is so simple. Lock’em up and throw away the key or give’em a shovel and make them work. And how many shanks to you think an inmate could make from a bicycle? Get real!

By: dishdog215

dishdog215 — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:34:19 +0000

MY FIX FOR PRISONS

BREIFLY…2 PRISONS

PRISON 1 – TOTAL LOCKDOWN, NO BENIFITS, BASIC FOOD

PRISON 2- PRISONERS WORK, GROW FOOD, MAKE PRODUCTS, EARN THEIR KEEP.. IN EXCHANGE FOR GAME TABLES, FOOD REWARDS, INCENTIVES

WHY??? PRISON 2 IS SELF-SUSTAINING, PRISONERS ARE MOTIVATED TO STAY IN-LINE, OR SENT TO PRISON 1. A PRODUCTIVE PRISONER HAS SENSE OF SELF WORTH. PROFITS FROM THEIR PRODUCTS GO TO COST OF INCARCERATION/VICTIMS FUNDS.
ARGUEMENT THEY TAKE AWAY JOBS… BALONEY, THOSE JOBS WENT TO MEXICO/CHINA… LETS STEAL THEM BACK
AT THE VERY LEAST, PRISONERS SHOULD PEDAL BICYCLES TO POWER OUR HOMES

By: Neil Sikora

Neil Sikora — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:24:28 +0000

How about “take a prisoner home” day? Each of our elected officials could participate by personally providing the housing/feeding/healthcare to one (or more) prisoner. The only way out of it was to help the prisoner find a job and housing. Staying with an elected official would also prompt the prisoner to get out. Just thinking “outside of the box” or cell (in this case).

By: Concerned Consumer

Concerned Consumer — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 16:47:26 +0000

A thought regarding prisoners… I think they need to look at limited scope work programs run by the state to have these guys cleaning up cities, roads, parks, and doing minor repair and construction work on various smaller problem areas in localities that cant fund misc improvements or repairs.

It would teach the lesser offenders some responsibility, some confidence, some accomplishment, some work skill and do some serving the community for their offenses.
its entirely possible that it may even help provide plus to the cost recovery for their incarcerations. Either way, it would help communities across michigan improve for low labor costs when there is just no room in the budget to accomplish those things.

On a side note:
It would also be nice to require persons who are on Unemployment and DHS assistance to volunteer at a shelter or charity for 2 hours in one day once a week until employed again.
It would also be nice to require anyone making over 100k per year, to spend 6 hours per month volunteering at a Mission/Shelter/Food distribution/or Medical charity location in the state and help and speak with the patrons. Then submit a letter to the editor of the local news agency on “What I learned this month from ordinary people who are struggling and how I can help.”

By: Concerned Consumer

Concerned Consumer — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 16:36:39 +0000

#2 and #3 sound good. #1 does not.
But, it all starts at the top.
I know granholm has been donating a percentage of her salary back to the state for years.
However, we cannot have state elected officials, including congress and their staff suckling off the taxpayer teet when the economy has tanked and we face high unemployment and higher yet Under employment and continued job and industry losses statewide.
I think all of our State politicians from top to bottom and their staff members should have their salaries cut by the rate of current state unemployment.
Then i think they need to pay average deductibles and limit their benefits to the average corporation provided policies in the state.
They should NOT be getting better benefits than the average private company can provide in the state. Why? because then these yahoos, that most state citizens dont like or approve of, Dont feel our pain, and are there for the money and benefits not the NOble purpose of serving our citizens and state with Good sound Progressive policy that Fixes problems.

And if you’re part of the republican platform, then you’re platform is the Complete and Total Destruction and disassembly of our state and federal government and its services and purpose, with the exception of the job you want, and its high pay and benefits, then give yourself a raise, after you lower the tax rate for the richest people on earth.

So the answer to that issue is to get rid of the Comfort that is provided to elected officials and their staff. Then the only people who’ll want to be there are those who want to help our state and its people.

Theres plenty of better qualified Michigan people who dont owe favors, who’d do those jobs for half the pay.

If you listen to many of these elected persons, you’ll notice that virtually none of their supposed past qualifications seem to ever come into play except to manipulate the system to their benefit.

By: Tom Erdmann

Tom Erdmann — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 16:30:33 +0000

Truth in sentencing is another bumper sticker policy that doesn’t make sense. When a prisoner has been “good”, why not reward him with a reduced sentence. Then, let’s spend money monitoring and helping him return to society, rather than paying guards to keep him in prison, so he can learn how to be a better criminal.

By: Bill Werth

Bill Werth — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 14:57:23 +0000

We could reduce the prison population by changes in the sentencing guidelines; if nonviolent first offenders were given a fine with close supervision this would reduce our prison costs and the fine would pay for the supervision.

By: Rick Olson

Rick Olson — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 13:53:32 +0000

These proposals make sense to control costs of corrections, without being “soft on crime”. We also need to look further at the levels of wages and benefits of prison workers and privatizing support services to minimize costs.