Nearly 7 out of 10 prisoners is destined to return to prison after being released. Yet, when the chopping block returns, it is the programs that can go to reduce these figures that are the first to go from the prison budget. Take this report from California Watch showing that prisoners don’t have access to education:
Fewer than one in every ten California inmates are enrolled in an educational program, despite a pledge by state officials to enhance rehabilitation efforts in order to cut recidivism and relieve prison overcrowding. An estimated 14,360 inmates were taking part in a variety of academic classes out of a total adult inmate population of 162,608, according to a report [PDF] released last week by the California Rehabilitation Oversight Board.
The bigger problem is that it seems that some seats for potential students are even going unused. Meanwhile, education at the UC and CSU systems gets more expensive every year. The way we reduce our expenditures on prisons isn’t to cut anti-recidivism programs, it is too make sure that they work and that prisoners are using them.
This occurs because the CCPOA who controls things wants to insure job security. As long as inmates return through the revolving door the need for their job is secure. Furthermore, it is this same group of people that incite the violence we see in the media. As long as the inmates are at each others throats the guards are safe, or so they believe. These same people encourage the inmates to share stories so they can better their trade because as everyone knows they can’t be rehabilitated and they have to get money somehow.
CCPOA works to incite fear and hatred in California so that we look to the corrections system as the solution to all problems. They love hearing the phrase “Let’s get tough on …” because they know that it results in more inmates, more jobs, and (most importantly) more overtime.
They are talking rehabilitation now, but their DNA is all about fear and hate.
Cuts to the state budget are reducing access to televised distance learning classes at California prisons. I talked to an administrator who had gotten thousands of students enrolled in these programs through a network of people doing this in addition to their regular jobs. With cutbacks at the prisons and the community colleges, numbers are crumbling.
Thank you Worst Governor Ever
recidivism proves the conservative adage that criminals can’t be reformed because they’re bad people. and since people in jail can’t vote, it effectively gerrymanders the electorate whiter, older, and richer.
what’s not to like, if you’re a republican?