A SENSIBLE PLAN TO CUT PRISON COST

Prisons are expanding faster than schools in Florida, and Department
of Corrections Secretary Walt McNeil is offering a compelling strategy
for reducing the cost. He would build smaller, less elaborate prisons
closer to home for short-term nonviolent offenders. His approach could
help lawmakers restore some semblance of budgetary balance, and it is
worth serious consideration.

McNeil likens such institutions to a state "jail," and he believes
they would save money while giving inmates a better shot at real
rehabilitation. One of the problems in most big prison settings is
that drug offenders and thieves end up learning from murderers and
robbers. The result is they leave prison more dangerous than when they
went in.

The smaller jails, by contrast, would be reserved for offenders who
are sentenced to less than two years for crimes that involve no
violence. Those types of inmates are more likely to succeed in
programs, such as drug and alcohol rehabilitation or job skills, that
can keep them from repeating their crimes. Locating the jails close to
the inmates' communities also helps them maintain family ties that are
critical for their return to society.

The financial reality facing the state is grim. McNeil projects the
prison population, now at 98,000, will grow to 125,000 inmates by
2012. The price tag to fill that gap with more high-cost, deep-end
prisons is at least $2-billion. But the state budget is still in the
midst of a historic shortfall, and McNeil, a former Tallahassee police
chief, knows there are too few dollars to go around.

"We can't just build our way out of this problem," he
says.

Florida is not alone in coping with a surging prison population. Other
states are turning to some comparatively radical approaches.
California is looking at early release and unsupervised parole for as
many as 22,000 nonviolent inmates. Kentucky is turning to house
arrest. Mississippi is reducing some inmates' sentences by as much as
75 percent.

McNeil's plan is more measured. He's not asking to turn any inmates
loose. Instead, he wants to use the jail concept to find better ways
to punish small-time offenders. The legislative impulse to send every
felon to the Big House, behind those razor-wire fences in rural prison
complexes, has not helped. That's part of the reason the prison
population continues to soar.

As it now stands, taxpayers end up providing room, board and medical
care not just to the most dangerous. They also subsidize the one of
every three inmates who are convicted of drug and nonviolent crimes.

In some cases, imprisonment is not a smart approach, particularly when
it leaves victims with no restitution and criminals rushing through a
revolving door. If an offender is not a physical threat and in prison
for a short stay, why not make him work and pay back the victim?

McNeil might well encounter resistance from urban areas that don't
want jails in their backyards and rural counties that want all the
prison jobs to themselves. But he is on the right track. Florida now
spends $20,000 a year to house each inmate, nearly three times what it
spends to educate each school student. The less it does of the former,
the more it can do of the latter.