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A Perspective on Corrections In America
No matter from what perspective one views America’s various federal, state and local corrections systems, most fall woefully short of any reasonable effort towards rehabilitating their inmate populations. More accurately stated, and to the point, our present penal system simply does adequately fulfill the needs of society. We’ve all heard the expression, “prisons are revolving doors.” The reason for this phenomenon is… that while corrections folks have the punishment aspect of prison sentences down to a science, the majority fall flat on their collective faces in the equally if not more important aspect of most prison sentences….rehabilitation. What is the point of locking a person up for one, five or even twenty years, and at the expiration of their sentence returning them to society with few if any, marketable skills. It’s a recipe for disaster…A recipe for recidivism.
Every year the cost of maintaining the prison industrial complex in the United States continues to rise at monumental and alarming rates, as the numbers of inmates necessary to justify the expenses associated with the ever growing systems similarly increases. In the hearts and minds of those who administrate the huge corrections budgets the methodology employed to justify their rehabilitative failures, is to keep feeding an endless supply of inmates into the system. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, and the State Departments of Corrections country-wide are fond of quoting recidivism rates that go off the charts as justification for requesting more and more funding. They employ all manner of terror tactics, and horror stories in their efforts to scare taxpayers into supporting their virtually bottomless money pits. What they don’t tell you, is where and how the money is spent, and therein lies much of the problem. The average citizen hasn’t the vaguest clue as to what goes on behind the walls of a prison, and as long as the inmates are locked safely behind the wall, he feels safe and secure, because that is the hyperbole the system’s public relations people feeds him. What they don’t tell you and I, is that some day most of these inmates will hit the streets again…and at such time as they are released back among us, a majority of them will be ill prepared to integrate into the job market by reason of not possessing an education or a marketable trade or skill, and/or they will not have been afforded an opportunity to acquire the necessary social skills to function as useful members of society. The plain fact is, they will have simply served their time in one of America’s people warehouses, that we call prisons.
Let us for a moment take for example the State of Connecticut with it’s almost one Billion Dollar Corrections Budget. Have you any idea how much waste and “fat” is contained in that budget, and how few dollars of that budget finds its way to education, job training skills, and/or social education? One billion dollars to food, clothe, house, feed, and provide medical care for 23,000 inmates. That is almost forty-three and one half thousand dollars per inmate, and virtually none of it for education. Sure, they’ll point out that they provide a bit of sex offender treatment, but that’s only because sex offender treatment is in vogue these days, and because they receive yet more money from external sources to fund that type of programming. The Federal Government will spend well over Six Billion Dollars to house about 210,000 inmates, or about 30,000 per inmate in calendar year 2010. That doesn’t take into account funding the BOP receives for special projects. The BOP does offer some drug rehabilitation, and they do offer GED Classes, but that’s about the extent of their formal programs. Other state’s budgets vary some what, but the bottom line is that it costs between $30,000 and $50,000 per inmate in systems that that only partially work, and we the taxpayers take the hit for every one of those dollars.
What is the answer? We are not sure there is any single magic bullet to solve all the problems associated with inmate rehabilitation. If you have a loved one in prison, however, and with one in 37 Americans having been to prison, many American families today have someone they know or love doing time you already know a good part of the answer; the development of education, and job skills acquisition programs. Such programs will undoubtedly have a drastic impact towards dropping the recidivism rate, and in the process make for a stronger and more secure America.
So many inmates if availed an opportunity, would happily choose education and/or technical training as the answer to their problems, and a wonderful alternative to a life of crime. If they had a way of earning a living and supporting their families, many of those in prison today would never again re-offend.
A Perspective on Corrections In America
No matter from what perspective one views America’s various federal, state and local corrections systems, most fall woefully short of any reasonable effort towards rehabilitating their inmate populations. More accurately stated, and to the point, our present penal system simply does adequately fulfill the needs of society. We’ve all heard the expression, “prisons are revolving doors.” The reason for this phenomenon is… that while corrections folks have the punishment aspect of prison sentences down to a science, the majority fall flat on their collective faces in the equally if not more important aspect of most prison sentences….rehabilitation. What is the point of locking a person up for one, five or even twenty years, and at the expiration of their sentence returning them to society with few if any, marketable skills. It’s a recipe for disaster…A recipe for recidivism.
Every year the cost of maintaining the prison industrial complex in the United States continues to rise at monumental and alarming rates, as the numbers of inmates necessary to justify the expenses associated with the ever growing systems similarly increases. In the hearts and minds of those who administrate the huge corrections budgets the methodology employed to justify their rehabilitative failures, is to keep feeding an endless supply of inmates into the system. The Federal Bureau of Prisons, and the State Departments of Corrections country-wide are fond of quoting recidivism rates that go off the charts as justification for requesting more and more funding. They employ all manner of terror tactics, and horror stories in their efforts to scare taxpayers into supporting their virtually bottomless money pits. What they don’t tell you, is where and how the money is spent, and therein lies much of the problem. The average citizen hasn’t the vaguest clue as to what goes on behind the walls of a prison, and as long as the inmates are locked safely behind the wall, he feels safe and secure, because that is the hyperbole the system’s public relations people feeds him. What they don’t tell you and I, is that some day most of these inmates will hit the streets again…and at such time as they are released back among us, a majority of them will be ill prepared to integrate into the job market by reason of not possessing an education or a marketable trade or skill, and/or they will not have been afforded an opportunity to acquire the necessary social skills to function as useful members of society. The plain fact is, they will have simply served their time in one of America’s people warehouses, that we call prisons.
Let us for a moment take for example the State of Connecticut with it’s almost one Billion Dollar Corrections Budget. Have you any idea how much waste and “fat” is contained in that budget, and how few dollars of that budget finds its way to education, job training skills, and/or social education? One billion dollars to food, clothe, house, feed, and provide medical care for 23,000 inmates. That is almost forty-three and one half thousand dollars per inmate, and virtually none of it for education. Sure, they’ll point out that they provide a bit of sex offender treatment, but that’s only because sex offender treatment is in vogue these days, and because they receive yet more money from external sources to fund that type of programming. The Federal Government will spend well over Six Billion Dollars to house about 210,000 inmates, or about 30,000 per inmate in calendar year 2010. That doesn’t take into account funding the BOP receives for special projects. The BOP does offer some drug rehabilitation, and they do offer GED Classes, but that’s about the extent of their formal programs. Other state’s budgets vary some what, but the bottom line is that it costs between $30,000 and $50,000 per inmate in systems that that only partially work, and we the taxpayers take the hit for every one of those dollars.
What is the answer? We are not sure there is any single magic bullet to solve all the problems associated with inmate rehabilitation. If you have a loved one in prison, however, and with one in 37 Americans having been to prison, many American families today have someone they know or love doing time you already know a good part of the answer; the development of education, and job skills acquisition programs. Such programs will undoubtedly have a drastic impact towards dropping the recidivism rate, and in the process make for a stronger and more secure America.
So many inmates if availed an opportunity, would happily choose education and/or technical training as the answer to their problems, and a wonderful alternative to a life of crime. If they had a way of earning a living and supporting their families, many of those in prison today would never again re-offend.