SINGING THE PRISON BLUES Maybe it's the money. Texas prisons cost $2 billion a year to operate. Maybe it's the size. Texas has seen its prison population soar to the largest in the nation. Maybe it's the embarrassment. It does not reflect well on the presidential campaign of Gov. George W. Bush that one in 20 adult Texans was in prison or jail or on probation or parole on his watch. No matter the motivation, the time was right for the remarkable pronouncement this week by key lawmakers. "There will be no prisons built during the next legislative session," said Rep. Pat Haggerty, R-El Paso, chairman of the House Corrections Committee. State Sen. Ken Armbrister, D-Victoria, made clear his views as well: "I don't think the tenor is there in either the House or the Senate to pass additional bonds." After a decade of jail construction, which more than tripled Texas' prison capacity from 50,000 beds to 155,000, their comments signal a dramatic change in direction for the state's criminal justice system. It's about time. Long tough on crime, it's time for Texas to get smart on crime. Maintaining a system that locks away violent offenders with nonviolent ones is too expensive and unduly harsh. Certainly, the state should lock up violent criminals and keep them behind bars until they have served their sentences. But Texas sends too many nonviolent drug offenders to prison and clogs its jails by sending people back to prison over petty infractions that violate their parole or probation. Fifty percent of incoming prisoners are convicts who have violated terms of parole or probation. Armbrister and Haggerty are only two members in a House and Senate that number 181. What makes their comments so significant is that they represent the more conservative voices in the Legislature. Conservatives traditionally have staked out the "build them and fill them" approach to criminal justice. It was good politics. Sending criminals -- both violent and nonviolent -- to jail was an answer to the public's call to do something about rising crime. But the prison industry offered other benefits. Just as President Hoover in the 1920s promised a chicken in every pot, Texas lawmakers from rural or small communities in the 1990s vowed to bring a prison to their districts to uplift slumping economies. The state, with 254 counties, operates 116 prisons. With crime rates down and the need for state services up, lawmakers will be looking at less costly alternatives to deal with nonviolent offenders, said Sens. Bill Ratliff, R-Mount Pleasant, and Gonzalo Barrientos, D-Austin. Barrientos rightly is calling for more drug rehabilitation, education and job training programs. Ratliff, chairman of the budget writing Senate Finance Committee, doubts that the state can afford new prisons given other budget priorities. "Health issues will be the bear in the living room," Ratliff said. Barrientos has conducted an analysis that shows the Texas Department of Criminal Justice request for new prison expansion would eat up the entire projected surplus, about $1.6 billion. Prison officials have asked the Legislature to issue $544 million in bonds for 8,500 new beds. Barrientos, a long-time advocate of steering nonviolent offenders to alternatives, said the state would spend $1.7 billion more each year to operate those new prisons. The convergence of budget issues and waning public interest in prisons presents Texas lawmakers a unique opportunity. We can and should look at alternatives starting with nonviolent offenders and people who commit petty parole or probation violations. One of five people is behind bars in Texas because of a drug offense, and more than 89,000 people are incarcerated for nonviolent crimes. Half of those going into prisons are ex-convicts who violated parole or probation. Texas prisons should not be clogged up with people who miss an appointment with a parole officer, cross the county line without permission or break curfew. Prison beds should be reserved for violent offenders -- killers, rapists, child molesters and those who assault others. In some cases, it might be appropriate to imprison repeat offenders, especially if their crimes escalate. When the Legislature convenes in 2001, it should seize this opportunity.
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