Don't Get Too Lonely, Jim

Jim Webb has been a fairly disappointing conservative Democrat thus far in the US Senate, but his profile and life experience gives him an opportunity to take on "third rail" issues in ways that other politicians can't. I'm delighted that he's belatedly begun one of these crusades with the issue of prison reform.

This spring, Webb (D-Va.) plans to introduce legislation on a long-standing passion of his: reforming the U.S. prison system. Jails teem with young black men who later struggle to rejoin society, he says. Drug addicts and the mentally ill take up cells that would be better used for violent criminals. And politicians have failed to address this costly problem for fear of being labeled "soft on crime."

It is a gamble for Webb, a fiery and cerebral Democrat from a staunchly law-and-order state. Virginia abolished parole in 1995, and it trails only Texas in the number of people it has executed. Moreover, as the country struggles with two wars overseas and an ailing economy, overflowing prisons are the last thing on many lawmakers' minds.

But Webb has never been one to rely on polls or political indicators to guide his way. He seems instead to charge ahead on projects that he has decided are worthy of his time, regardless of how they play -- or even whether they represent the priorities of the state he represents.

There is no more easily demagogued issue in America that prison reform. Conservatives find it unacceptable that we should do anything other than warehouse prisoners for as long as humanly possible (unless they are Republican officeholders, that is), and will assail anyone with a contrary view as being insufficiently "tough on crime." As a result, the prison-industrial complex is one of the fastest-growing in the nation, with overcrowding persisting throughout the country and skyrocketing costs of incarceration. We have 2.3 million Americans in jail, a higher percentage than any country on Earth, and a shocking amount of them are inside for violating parole or a low-level drug offense, when tax dollars could be spent much better treating and rehabilitating them. Not to mention that longer sentences and overcrowding hamper what meager rehab programs exist, sending recidivism rates soaring and turning jails into colleges for harder crime. And any thought given to the rights and well-being of the prisoner is met with derision. Why, who cares if there's arsenic in their drinking water, they should have thought about that before they broke the law!

The drinking water pumped from two wells at Kern Valley State Prison contained arsenic, a known cause of cancer, in amounts far higher than a federal safety standard soon to take effect.

Yet today, nearly three years after missing the government's deadline to reduce the arsenic levels, the state has no concrete plans or funding to do so. Officials spent $629,000 to design a filtration system and then decided not to build it, while neglecting to inform staff and inmates that they were consuming contaminated water.

After the prison finally posted notices last April on orders from the state Department of Public Health, the inmates continued drinking the water, under protest.

"We have no choice," said Larry Tillman, 38, who was serving time for burglary. "We should at the very least receive bottled water, or truck in water from another city."

You're a terrorist-coddler if you try to raise this issue.

Webb's ideas are pretty solid:

Webb aims much of his criticism at enforcement efforts that he says too often target low-level drug offenders and parole violators, rather than those who perpetrate violence, such as gang members. He also blames policies that strip felons of citizenship rights and can hinder their chances of finding a job after release. He says he believes society can be made safer while making the system more humane and cost-effective.

Webb isn't known to shy from a fight. He said this spring that he'll introduce legislation that creates a national panel to recommend ways to overhaul the criminal justice system [...] Webb said, the United States could learn from the Japanese system. In his book, "A Time to Fight," he wrote that the Japanese focused less on retribution. Sentences were short, and inmates often left prison with marketable job skills. Ironically, he said, the system was modeled on philosophies pioneered by Americans, who he says have since lost their way on the matter.

Webb believes he can guide the nation back. "Contrary to so much of today's political rhetoric," he wrote, "to do so would be an act not of weakness but of strength."

Though I don't agree with his framing of it as about "locking up the right people instead of the wrong people," Webb deserves credit for carrying this issue. However, I doubt he'll find many partners. Right now it's too politically volatile at the national level to make the completely sound point that trapping millions of citizens in a cycle of incarceration and addiction harms our economy as much as our crime rate. In the states there are many groundbreaking programs that return the corrections system to what should be its core role of rehabilitation and job training and returning prisoners back to civil society with survival skills. It's cheaper in the long run and it reduces the explosion of corrections in state budgets. But at the national level, I guess it's not very serious to talk about prison reform.

I've asked the Obama transition team about their perspective on criminal justice and prison reform at their "Open for Questions" virtual town hall. I'll let you know if I get a response.

California's Insane Parole Policy

A remarkable little report appeared over the weekend, one that should have been on the desks of every member in the Legislature come Monday morning, but one which I suspect wasn't. In fact, I don't think it even made any of the papers, relegated to a sidebar on CapAlert.

California has more men and women locked up in prison than any other state, a new federal report finds, and unlike any other state, the vast majority of those placed behind bars are parole violators.

The report bolsters contentions by critics of the much-overcrowded prison system that state parole officers, who belong to the same union as prison guards, are extraordinarily willing to slap a parole inmate back behind bars, thereby exacerbating a prison overcrowding problem [...]

On average, the nation's state and federal prisons took in almost two new offenders for every parole violator, but in California, the reverse is true. In 2007, California prisons took in 139,608 inmates and 92,628 of them were parole violators, almost a 2-1 ratio. In only one other state, Washington, did parole violators outnumber those being jailed by the courts, and that was only by 126 inmates.

Here's the report from the Department of Justice.

It is a financial and moral disaster that we are throwing men and women back in jail for parole violations at such an accelerated rate, far beyond any other state in the country. This is clearly a factor of the state's parole policy, which is too constrictive and too quick to return people to prison. It surely leads to the high recidivism rate for those who commit crimes multiple times - if they feel they can't escape the system once they're in it, they simply have no incentive to rehabilitate themselves.

Yet instead of reforming parole policy and getting some much-needed sanity into our sentencing laws, the bipartisan Tough on Crime machine squashes an independent sentencing commission and allows the passage of Prop. 9, which would implement an even MORE restrictive parole system, so much so that it violates the state constitution.

A federal judge has blocked enforcement of portions of a ballot measure approved last month by California voters that modify the state's parole revocation system.

The so-called Victims' Bill of Rights of 2008, passed on Nov. 4 as Proposition 9, amends the Penal Code to restrict or eliminate rights gained in a 14-year-old class action lawsuit in Sacramento federal court, parolees' attorneys argue.

Parolees and the state agreed in March 2004 to a permanent injunction issued by U.S. District Judge Lawrence K. Karlton mandating an overhaul of parole revocation procedures and guaranteeing due process for ex-convicts accused of parole violations.

Ten days after the election, attorneys for the parolees filed a motion seeking to enforce the 2004 injunction, saying Proposition 9 "purports to eliminate nearly all due process rights of parolees and directly conflicts with the protections put in place by the injunction and established constitutional law."

We are diseased by the prison-industrial complex. Prison construction is good for the CCPOA and supposedly good for the economy but it's based on a flawed notion that all construction spending is valuable. In fact, prison construction, especially of the type so needless that bringing parole policy in line with the other 49 states in the union would practically eliminate the overcrowding crisis and rendering the need for more beds moot, crowds out other, more valuable building projects that have a tangible value to people's lives. We are violating the human rights of inmates and the Constitutional provision against cruel and unusual punishment, as well as stifling innovative public investment, because the parole officers have a powerful lobby and the Tough on Crime dementia has infested the minds of practically every legislator in the state for 30 years.

Fixing parole policy and putting up-front money into drug treatment and prevention programs would save the state billions. It requires leadership. That's a limited resource right now in Sacramento.

California's Prison Crisis: Another "Deal" Without Reform

I've found myself wistful over the demise of health care reform in California, if only because it was so painful to watch. It was fairly glaring from the start that the resources and the budget structure weren't there to manage such a big issue. The lesson learned should be that a broader consensus has to be reached, but also that you have to work within the narrow structures forced by the state's processes, or else work to change them. Such is also the case with prison reform, which is actually a far less insurmountable a goal.

About a week ago we heard about a potential "deal" on solving the prison crisis, where the state would settle the lawsuits that are forcing the possibility of a dramatic release of prisoners. But notice how this is being done. It's a "deal" without reform.

SACRAMENTO -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration is exploring a settlement of two lawsuits that would require California to dramatically reduce the number of inmates in its overcrowded prisons -- and limit the Legislature's influence on the issue, according to participants in the discussions.

The settlement discussions in the federal court cases, which have been consolidated, are in an early stage, and the framework of a deal has not been ironed out.

The talks are not formally tied to Schwarzenegger's proposal last week to release tens of thousands of low-risk prisoners to save the state money. That plan, which essentially reverses the court position he has taken opposing the early release of inmates, is expected to die in the Legislature, where it would need approval from Republicans who adamantly oppose it.

But it could become the basis for a negotiated settlement, prisoners' lawyers said.

The proposal is "a step in the right direction," said Donald Specter, director of the nonprofit Prison Law Office and one of the attorneys for inmates in the case. His group is asking a panel of three federal judges to cap the state's prison population.

"We would rather settle this case and have the state do this than have the court do it," Specter said.

Even if lawmakers reject his proposal, Schwarzenegger could implement the inmate releases he envisions as part of a settlement, known as a consent decree, that the judges would approve. That would put extreme pressure on legislators to make the appropriate changes to state law.

This has nothing to do with reforming a broken system, just as the absurd attempt to build our way out of the problem last year did nothing. It's the draconian sentencing and parole issues that are leading to overcrowding, a shortage of rehabilitation and treatment services, and the country's largest recidivism rate. This is completely obvious. Here's a quick statistic: California has 30 times as many children between the ages of 14 and 17 in prison for life without the possibility of parole than THE ENTIRE REST OF THE WORLD COMBINED. There's actually a bill, SB999 (Yee), that would end this horrific practice. But it's by no means the only outsized sentence that we have on the books.

You can go back and forth on who should get released and what crimes should be absolved, and politicians, Democrats and Republicans alike, can demagogue the issue and scare the bejeebus out of their constituents with lurid tales of "criminals roaming our streets," but what they won't tell you is that this is a problem of their own doing. By sentencing nonviolent offenders to overcrowded jails that become little more than schools on how to commit violent crimes, they are threatening public safety and risking a total collapse of the system. Only by attacking this crisis at the root will anything be solved. And in this way, it mirrors the health care debate. The Governor is seeking a "deal" with a narrow group of interests without looking at the larger problems in the debate. In health care it was costs; in prison reform it's sentencing.

The 45 days allowed by Proposition 58 for the legislature to act in this special session and the urgency of the situation may bring about some thoughtful policy in this area or it may prove an impossibility and devolve into a new orgy of demagoguery and what our Governor calls “Kabuki theater”—a stylized and ritualized play on the stage of politics where our elected leaders try to prove they are tougher on crime. Given how we have gotten into this mess, with the constant one-upmanship of over 1000 laws passed ratcheting up sentences for all sorts of crimes since 1977 when California switched to a determinate sentencing law scheme (fixed terms rather than leaving some discretion in sentencing and releasing criminals with an eye towards rehabilitation), I am somewhat dubious. California is now responsible for 1 out of every 5 new inmates in the country in prison. Some Republicans in the legislature still don’t get it. Tomorrow, during the regular session, the Assembly Public Safety Committee will take up at least two proposals to increase sentences and add to that list of 1000.

The failure of leadership in this area is truly sad to see. And until we actually address these sundry problems in a comprehensive way that looks at root causes instead of playing to what we think citizens want to hear, that leadership deficit will widen.

At The Earliest Beginnings of Prison Reform

Today the Joint Economic Committee, composed of Senators Webb and Schumer along with New York Rep. Carolyn Maloney, held a hearing on certainly the most underappreciated issue facing America - our prison crisis. Here's part of Rep. Maloney's statement:

The United States has the highest incarceration rates in the world, with more than 2 million Americans currently in jails or prisons. Clearly, imprisonment benefits society and is an important public safety measure. But faced with an unprecedented increase in incarceration, we must ask ourselves whether we are striking the right balance between the costs and benefits of imprisonment.

Putting more resources into creating economic opportunities that provide alternatives to crime would pay dividends in reducing crime and incarceration, while also strengthening families and communities.

We all know that in the long run crime doesn’t pay, but it sure is costly. The average annual cost of incarceration for one federal prisoner exceeds $20,000 – far more than the average annual cost of $3,700 for a youth program, $6,000 for a job training program or the $13,000 for tuition at public universities.

There is no question that crime rates have dropped in the U.S. over the past decade. Researchers agree that the increase in incarceration rates have been driven by tougher sentences for repeat offenders and drug offenders, mandatory minimums, and a more punitive approach to post-release supervision, rather than an increase in crime.

These are precisely the problems that California faces, due to a complete failure of legislative leadership and a panoply of thousands of tougher sentencing laws. Today Dan Weintraub reports on the stirrings of a long-overdue reform of the system, before it's too late.

The Schwarzenegger administration, which has been cautious to a fault when it comes to prison reform, is tiptoeing back toward the idea of loosening restrictions on parolees who are good bets to stay out of trouble.

The program is starting with a trial run in Orange County, where ex-cons who are considered the lowest risks and then meet a series of benchmarks will be cut loose from state super- vision after six months instead of three years.

The idea is to give those parolees an incentive to get their lives back on stable ground shortly after they leave prison, which is when most felons return to a life of crime. Then, by letting them off parole early, the state figures it will be able to concentrate more resources on more-dangerous felons who need the most attention.

Parole reform is to prison reform as S-CHIP is to the broader health care issue. It's a baby step on the road to really making those tough decisions. But it's taken so long to get to this point, and change is being forced only through a crisis and a potential capping of the prison population, that I guess we have to be happy for what we get. There's going to be major pushback on this from the right (it's already happening on the Flush Report) so it's important that this under-the-radar issue gets attention and support.

Pressuring Ahnold on Prisons

It's well-known that Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata wasn't particularly happy with the sellout prison construction bill that the Governor signed last week. It's also well-known that none of the "reforms" in that prison bill will do anything to lower the prison overcrowding rate before the fast-approaching deadline for the state to appear before a judge and prove that the situation has changed. So Perata is using some old-fashioned arm-twisting to get some real reforms in the corrections system.

The Senate Democratic leader is urging Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to use his administrative power to change parole rules to ease severe prison crowding, possibly by as many as 8,100 inmates.

Senate President Pro Tempore Don Perata, D-Oakland, said Republican opposition kept parole reform out of a $7.8 billion plan to ease overcrowding through a building program and transferring some prisoners to other states.

Perata said speculation at the Capitol that the bill signed by the Republican governor last week includes an unwritten “side deal” to have Schwarzenegger bypass the Legislature and administratively enact parole changes is inaccurate.

“I wouldn't call it a deal,” Perata said of talks with the governor. “What we said is we couldn't put it in the bill because the Republicans wouldn't support it.

“We said further that if you don't do something with parole, you can't make any of this work,” said Perata. “So you've got the ability to do it. It's up to you to do it.”

Of course, I'd rather they tried to put this in the bill, dared the Republicans to block it, and then run on the consequences. But clearly, Perata is trying to leverage the judicial deadline (which is the only reason anything got done on a prison bill in the first place) to bring about a saner policy. I don't like that the Democratic leadership appeared to cave on this policy and gave the Governor most of what he wanted; I personally think that, without real reform, they'll have to do the same damn thing five years from now. But at least Perata is trying to use the deadline to his advantage, after it was used to his detriment previously.

Perhaps Perata could get Mike Jimenez of the CCPOA, who's disinclined to the Governor's plan, to join him in calling for parole reform. And he should go further and introduce Sen. Romero's legislation for an independent sentencing commission. But this is making the best of a bad situation.