JAIL DECISION BUYS TIME FOR OTHER SOLUTIONS

Lawmakers take note; stop balancing your politically correct
"tough-on-crime" campaigns on the backs of county taxpayers.

Outagamie County supervisors decided Wednesday night we just can't afford
it any longer.

When the board voted down a $17.7 million proposal for a new jail and
administrative offices, it raised serious questions about this cycle of
arrest, prosecute, sentence and incarcerate, and whether building a jail,
at least this jail, was sound economic policy.

It was noted during the meeting that county policy can't change state
legislation, and certainly to some degree this is true. But Supv. Al
Schmidt pointed out that "There's no incentive for them to change if we
keep building jails."

Nationwide, state prison populations have decreased. Although state and
federal prisons are operating at capacity or above, the actual inmate
population is declining slightly, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice
Statistics. It is the first measured decline in state prison populations
since 1972. And yet, counties across the state are eager to build extra
jail cells specifically to sell them to the state to house its felons.

Indeed, what incentive does the state have to change?

Meanwhile, our local jail space is aggravated by longer sentences and jail
time ordered for infractions that years ago would have netted probation at
best. We demanded tougher sentencing on drunk drivers and drug offenders
and now we're paying for it. But the argument that tougher sentencing in
these crimes is a deterrent has failed to bear fruit.

Nationwide, since 1980, drug arrests for possession alone have risen
dramatically. Meanwhile, violent crime and property victimization rates in
2000 were at the lowest since 1973, the year the bureau started its annual
survey.

Putting such monitoring technology as electronic bracelets to greater use
might have an impact on reducing nonviolent inmate populations, but it
won't accommodate the wave of growing sentences coming from our courts. We
have to find a better way to punish and rehabilitate nonviolent criminals
who are clearly neither deterred by the threat of jail time nor improved by
their stay. We have to correct this imbalance that has so many counties
building bigger jails even as the crime rate drops.

It's a tough assignment, but the county's vote just gave us a reason to
find a better answer.