Melot: Prison cuts have to
yield budget cuts
Granholm's reduction plans threatened by
numbers
March 2, 2010
Michigan has shown itself unwilling to raise the
money to operate a 50,000-inmate prison system
and run a state government on the side.
Looking at the governor's latest budget plan,
though, it seems Michigan won't be able to afford a
35,000-inmate prison system either.
Something isn't adding up somewhere, and
corrections reform hangs in the balance.
To her credit, Jennifer Granholm is trying to leave
office with a prison population reduced by one-
third since she took office. She's backing a
legislative effort this year to restore so-called "good
time" credits to the prison system that would
accelerate the release of thousands of felons.
This isn't going down well in many a quarter. The
state's association of prosecutors has blasted it, for
one. And critics retain a potent political argument:
An ex-con down the street is more dangerous than
a felon behind bars.
Countering that simply with discussions of the
nuances of incarceration, or an appeal to citizens to
grant second, or third, chances will lead only to
grief.
If shrinking the prison system does not yield major
savings for taxpayers, this idea is dead. And there's
plenty of reason to suspect prison reform is unwell.
In the last pre-Granholm budget, Michigan spent
$1.585 billion of its general fund on corrections.
That was 2003 when the prison population was
approaching 50,000.
The prison system’s annual peak was 51,500 in
2006. The two budgets that cover part of that
calendar year spent $1.815 billion and $1.866
billion on corrections. (All figures are general fund
only.)
By fiscal 2008, corrections was taking $1.981
billion.
Since then, the prison population has gone down.
And corrections spending is dipping, too.
But only dipping.
In her 2011 budget, Granholm envisions a prison
population of 35,000, but a corrections budget of
$1.876 billion.
During a recent teleconference to tout her budget, I
asked the governor when Michigan could expect a
corrections budget closer to $1.5 billion than $2
billion. She ducked, she dodged, she didn't answer.
So, I asked Barb Levine of the Citizens Alliance on
Prisons & Public Spending the same question. She
replied:
"Darned good question. I was amazed to see how
little difference the population cuts seem to make ...
The flip side of your question is: How low will the
population have to go before any big money is
saved? At this rate, it looks like it will have to get
down to 15,000!"
And this from a group that advocates for just the
kind of pro-parole and prison reduction strategies
Granholm is pushing.
Michigan residents aren't going to live with a
15,000-inmate prison system. And they aren't going
to push this Legislature or future ones for
reductions if big savings are not part of the bargain.
Any state that spends more than a quarter of its
general fund on a 50,000-inmate prison system is
in trouble. It lacks the resources to invest in
infrastructure, in universities, in its law-abiding
citizens.
So, where does that leave a state that spends almost
that much for a 35,000-inmate system?
What do you think? Write Derek Melot, Lansing State
Journal, 120 E. Lenawee St., Lansing, MI 48919. For
past columns, visit www.lsj.com/columnists.
