Early Release Program: Part 3 of Series

[Forevermah]

Early Release Program: Part 3 of Series
Illinois seeks solution to ballooning prison costs

By Edith Brady-Lunny
 Sunday, March 27, 2011 7:00 am


In 2008, Mississippi lawmakers knew something had to change or the state would spend millions on new prison beds.

"We were facing the possibility of going broke just to keep up," said state Sen. Willie Simmons, who worked in the state's correctional system for 30 years before joining the legislature and leading the corrections committee.

Thus, a series of changes in sentencing laws and parole programs resulted in the release of 4,516 inmates to parole since 2008, according to the Mississippi Department of Corrections.

Illinois also faces serious challenges with its prisons' budget and population, which clocked a record 48,739 inmates earlier this month. The higher census follows a trend that started in January 2010 after Gov. Pat Quinn halted the Meritorious Good Time (MGT) and MGT-Push programs.

MGT gave inmates up to 180 days' credit for good conduct. The short-lived MGT-Push removed a requirement that inmates serve a minimum of 60 days even if their anticipated stay in prison was below that mark.

The Illinois Department of Corrections has made it a high priority to create a replacement for MGT.

"We are continuing our analysis and discussions about credit that could be earned by inmates in the Department of Corrections," Cara Smith, the agency's chief of staff, told The Pantagraph this week.

The IDOC budget could increase more than 10 percent to $1.36 billion in 2012, with much of the new funding covering salaries of additional correctional officers hired to reduce overtime costs brought about by the increased prison population.

In Illinois

Before the MGT controversy, Illinois was making progress in efforts to better prepare inmates for re-entry to their communities because the state has a 51.3 percent recidivism rate.

But now, inmates returning to the outside world may be less likely to succeed because IDOC has limited educational and counseling services available.

The Danville Correctional Center, for instance, has a shortage of teachers for its GED and adult basic education programs available for its 1,821 prisoners, according to a recent report from the John Howard Association of Illinois.

Given the length of the GED waiting list, many inmates will finish their prison term before they are eligible for class, said the association, which monitors juvenile and adult corrections facilities.

In other states

Nationwide, 27 states reported fewer prison admissions in 2009, according to the federal Bureau of Statistics. Illinois was among 23 states with higher prison populations.

In that year, some 1.4 million people were behind bars in state prisons, a decrease of 5,739 from 2008. It was the first year-to-year drop since 1972.

States that have seen the sharpest drop in prison admissions have undertaken bold policy changes. While the fiscal challenges facing most states would be enough to convince officials to open cell doors, other factors also have played a part.

Mississippi has the highest incarceration rate in the nation, at 735 per 100,000 residents. There, state leaders implemented a series of changes starting in 2008 that allowed inmates to earn more "good-time credit" toward their release.

The prison population dropped further when lawmakers said all nonviolent offenders were eligible for parole after serving 25 percent of their sentence. The law had a unique, retroactive element that permitted about 3,000 inmates to be immediately eligible for parole.

In Michigan, the drop in prison population started four years ago after setting a record at 51,554. A recent census of about 44,000 reflects a policy shift that reduced the number of inmates who serve more than 100 percent of their minimum sentence.

"If you're a model citizen in prison, you're probably going to serve four years," said Michigan corrections spokesman John Cordell. He said the department budget has remained stable and would be significantly higher without the changes.

Michigan does not offer day-for-day good-conduct credit or meritorious good-time programs. Critics argue the state has not seen a corresponding shrink in the state's corrections budget.

Oregon also put new programs in place to release offenders sooner rather than later. But there, victim advocates criticize the emotional trauma that comes from court hearings for additional good-time credits for inmates.

Corrections officials say the earned-time program has saved an estimated $25 million and an average of 55 fewer days behind bars for eligible inmates.

Words matter

Across the country, states are trying to strike a balance between policies that ultimately reduce prison population and a perception that such policies can threaten public safety. And, sometimes, it's a matter of how the decisions are phrased: public word of MGT-Push came through the media, which termed it a "secret early release program."

In fact, it was essentially a tweak to an administrative rule already in place.

Last year, a study by the Pew Center on the States' Public Performance Project showed strong support for using money saved from prison spending to help pay for community-based parole and probation programs.

In Illinois, "early release" was used to describe the MGT program, although MGT actually did not reduce any inmates' sentences. A report prepared for IDOC in August suggests any replacement program for MGT be more in line with so-called "earned time" policies used in other states.

The Pew survey also showed the term "mandatory supervision" is favored over "alternatives to incarceration" and "community corrections."

Editor's note: The accompanying story is part of an ongoing Pantagraph series on Illinois' controversial early-release program for state prisoners.

Illinois is poised to increase its prison budget to hire more correctional officers. The state's prison population continues to swell as a result of Gov. Pat Quinn stopping the Meritorious Good Time and MGT-Push programs.

More than half of the states in the country reduced spending on corrections last year. Policy changes in several states resulted in several thousand inmates released early to community supervision.

Assistance for this series was provided through a research grant awarded to The Pantagraph in November 2010 by the Center on Media, Crime and Justice at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. Malcolm Young, director of the Program for Prison Re-entry Strategies at Northwestern School of Law, Evanston, helped with background and research.

http://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/article_0dd907e0-572f-11e0-b27e-001cc4c002e0.html

[NeddieB]

The State of Illinois should really take a look at other states and, I don't know, maybe "learn" something.  Such a shame that most of our politicians make decisions based on increasing their popularity and not what the right thing to do is.  Sometimes I think they (politicians) just put their head in the sand and pretend that everything is just fine with IDOC.  Eventually IDOC will receive more inmates than they literally have space to accommodate.  What then? I wasn't a math major but I do know simple math.  When more comes in than goes out you will have a surplus.

[kordsbabydoll]

     I just received a letter from my LO.  He just went into custody at Graham on the 25th from R&C.  He has only been there since 3/15/11. In the letter he said "everyone is saying in here good time should be here either May or October." Why is this rumor flying? Is it a rumor? I hope he isn't getting his hopes up!...You would think we(LO on the outside) would hear something first.  I'm not getting my hopes up, but I do have my fingers crossed that Quinn does something before over crowding gets so bad that people start getting hurt.

[Forevermah]

     I just received a letter from my LO.  He just went into custody at Graham on the 25th from R&C.  He has only been there since 3/15/11. In the letter he said "everyone is saying in here good time should be here either May or October." Why is this rumor flying? Is it a rumor? I hope he isn't getting his hopes up!...You would think we(LO on the outside) would hear something first.  I'm not getting my hopes up, but I do have my fingers crossed that Quinn does something before over crowding gets so bad that people start getting hurt.

These rumors have been flying since 2009 when good time was canelled.  No one knows when it will be back.  Tell him to not count on anything, if a new program comes back by the time he gets out and he is eligible to receive any, call it luck!

The statement that I made bold above is as much as anyone knows:


"We are continuing our analysis and discussions about credit that could be earned by inmates in the Department of Corrections," Cara Smith, the agency's chief of staff, told The Pantagraph this week.