EMPTY BEDS, EMPTY POCKETS

For A Quarter Century, The State Of Louisiana Has Paid To Put Prisoners In
Local Jails.That System Is Beginning To Change, And The Result Could Mean
Disaster.

Chaos reigns at the Iberia Parish Jail every Monday morning.

It's not the uproar of prisoners out of control but rather a frantic
scramble of phone calls from other wardens looking for inmates to put in
their jails because every bunk without a prisoner makes it that much harder
to pay the bills.

The first phone call arrives for Warden Roberta Boudreaux before 8 a.m. It
will be followed quickly by many more - each from a warden or sheriff
searching for enough inmates to fill their empty beds. Before long,
Boudreaux has to tell her secretary to divert the calls so she can
concentrate on the normal business of running the jail.

"It's tough," she says. "Some are so desperate they say they will come and
get just one if they are available. It doesn't matter as long as they can
fill another bed."

For more than a quarter century, the state has paid for inmates to be
housed in parish jails under the eye of local sheriffs. It is a system that
began as a stopgap measure to handle an overcrowded penal system but it has
become a way of doing business that everyone involved - the state, the
local jails, the sheriff's departments and the parish governments - depends
upon.

The system works because of simple math. Each parish or local jail is paid
$22.39 by the state each day for every Louisiana Department of Corrections
prisoner it holds. Parish prisoners, typically those arrested for
misdemeanor crimes or those awaiting trial, only draw $3.50 per day from
the local police jury.

As a result, every available bed in a parish jail filled with a state
inmate goes that much further toward keeping the budget in line. While the
state decrees how many prisoners will be in the parish jails, the local
sheriff's departments have the leeway to move them around at will.

"We meet early every Monday morning to figure out how much we spent last
week and how much we plan to spend the week coming," Boudreaux says. "Then
we look and see how many prisoners we have to have for the week ahead and
how many we can pass on to other jails that need them."

But massive expansion of state jails and a stabilizing inmate population
has suddenly left many local jails with empty beds and unbalanced budgets.
Between 1998 and 2002, the number of available beds at parish and local
jails has grown by 7,605. But only 4,169 more prisoners have entered in the
state system over that same period of time.

"It is the growth rate that is shrinking, not the total number of inmates,"
explains Louisiana Department of Corrections Secretary Richard Stalder.
"The capacity to hold prisoners has grown more rapidly at the local level
than demand and that has created the current surplus."

The reaction has caused the closure of at least three parish facilities and
stopped plans to construct part of a third - representing the loss of
almost 700 beds that could have been taken up by state prisoners. In
Avoyelles Parish alone, 200 beds were lost with the closure of the
Bordelonville Detention Center.

"I will admit, we are in a jam right now," says Avoyelles Parish Sheriff
Bill Belt. "There has been a proliferation of jail beds in the state.
Everyone built for capacity when they had the budget and now they can't get
the prisoners."

It only promises to get worse.

Only In Louisiana

As of June, 16,397 state prisoners were being housed in parish and local
jails, almost 45 percent of the 36,396 total DOC inmate population. No
other state even comes close to that amount. In fact, Louisiana accounts
for almost one-quarter of the inmates being held in local jails throughout
the United States.

The system is also unique for another reason. Louisiana is the only state
where state inmates are regularly kept in local jails for their entire
sentence. Typically, prisoners with sentences of less than 20 years will be
placed in a parish jail.

For fiscal year 2001-02, the DOC paid $145 million to fund the keeping of
these prisoners - a full 23 percent of the total budget and a 58 percent
increase over the amount paid five years ago.

It's a staggering amount of money that the state has almost no control over
when it leaves the department's coffers.

"Although this program is appropriated such a large amount of money from
the state general fund, there are no comprehensive performance data which
reflect the services the state is receiving for its money," wrote State
Legislative Auditor Danny Kyle in 2000.

Cost efficiency has ensured its survival. Providing $22.39 every day for
each state prisoner is cheaper than the $31 per day it costs to keep an
inmate in a state institution, not even counting additional expenses needed
for day-to-day operations.

"From a state perspective, this has been economically very good to us,"
says Stalder.

Overall, about 43 percent of the total beds available in parish jails are
taken up by state inmates. While the percentage varies jail to jail, the
key is to offset the expense of housing local prisoners with the profit
from the state inmates.

"It's the art of the balance," says Iberia Parish Sheriff Sid Hebert.

Jails On The Brink

While the frantic shuffling of prisoners each week is the surest sign of
the problems facing parish jails, a few have already been forced to use
more draconian measures to handle the loss of income.

* In Avoyelles Parish, the reduced number of state and federal inmates has
led to the loss of more than $4 million in revenue. Facing a $300,000
shortfall in his overall departmental budget, Belt was forced to lay off 50
employees and cut back on expenses and shutter the Bordelonville Detention
Center.

* Officials in Plaquemines Parish were counting on the income from state
and federal prisoners to finance a 550-bed expansion to the jail. When the
number of available state inmates began to drop, Sheriff Jeff Hingle was
still able to get approval to roll over a $6.3 million loan to help make
ends meet but was forced to cut more than $1.2 million out of the budget.
He did so by laying off more than 30 employees and curtailing car purchases.

* In West Feliciana Parish, Sheriff Austin Daniel announced he would have
to cut back on plans to build a new $9 million jail at Hardwood because of
the lack of available federal and state inmates. The facility was
originally planned to house 212 inmates but has been scaled back to only 96
beds and should now cost a third less, about $6.5 million.

For many, housing state prisoners is simply a way to break even. Sheriff's
departments have the ability to collect taxes and some have been able to
get voter approval on a millage to fund the jail. Yet, getting voter
approval is always an iffy proposition. Most rely on an arcane mix of
taxes, police jury funding and the state inmate proceeds to keep their
budget balanced.

"A lot of them can't make it on the $22.39 state (fee), but they have by
the DOC to the sheriffs for housing the inmates. Local jails neither track
nor report expenses relating to housing state prisoners.

"It is difficult for the Legislature to determine exactly how much of the
(money) it appropriates to the Sheriffs Housing of State Inmates program is
actually spent on DOC inmates," Kyle wrote.

The complexity of the system creates a huge blind spot when attempts are
made to oversee it. While the DOC controls the overall number of inmates in
the system to ensure the state prison populations are met, sheriffs have
the leeway to transfer prisoners between individual parish jails as they
see fit. It is this shuffling that creates the frantic Monday mornings as
each parish tries to get enough prisoners in their care to meet the demands
of their budget.

While admitting the state has little control over the funding once it is
paid to the local agencies, Stalder noted it is not his department's
responsibility to watchdog the finances of the agencies that house state
prisoners.

"It is a source of revenue for the local agency and as such they have to
maintain their own oversight," Stalder says.

Kyle recommended that the state seek a contract with the sheriffs that
outlined the specifics of housing state inmates. That contract should
stipulate the service a jail would provide, the conditions under which the
inmates would be kept and the manner of payment by the state to the local
authority.

No action was ever taken.

Increasing Beds

In April 1997, conditions at state prisons and jails had improved to the
point that Polozola released almost all of the state corrections system
from federal control. Angola and the juvenile prisons remained under his
jurisdiction until a settlement was reached with the state more than a year
later.

But rather than curtail the practice of keeping state inmates in parish
jails, the elimination of the courts' oversight of the system accelerated it.

Without federal limits on how many inmates a parish could house, many
sheriffs began increasing the number of beds in their jails, expanding the
existing facilities and initiating new building projects.

Between 1998 and 2002, the total number of beds in parish jails and local
facilities (for use by all inmates, local, state and federal) had surged 30
percent to 35,570. While many of these projects were undertaken to allow
housing federal inmates and limit parish prisoner overcrowding, many were
undertaken with the understanding they would be financed by putting state
prisoners in the new beds.

Although the DOC noticed the changing trends and altered their contracts
with state jails accordingly, many parishes continued jail construction.
"It is not now nor ever has it been my business to say a local jail needs
to be built or not built," Stalder says.

And the building boom did not go unnoticed by local police juries and
commissioners.

Typically the law enforcement arm of the sheriff's department is financed
by local taxes, usually property taxes. With the onset of the state inmate
system, many sheriffs began funding their jails with the state funds
instead. The expansion of local jails was fueled by the need to put more
state prisoners in the local facilities to make more money.

Watching From The Sidelines

One group that has kept a keen ear on these issues, particularly the
fiscal, is the parish governments. The concern of the police juries is that
if the state stops filling the beds, then they could end up paying for
something they never wanted to buy, says Marvin Lyons, the legislative
coordinator for the Police Jury Association of Louisiana.

"If the source of revenue is declining, they are going to look for some
place to find that money," he says. "If they force the issue and come to
us, our options are slim and none."

The worst-case scenario for a police jury is if a newly expanded jail is
suddenly filled with local prisoners. At any time, a sheriff can begin
acting on warrants for minor offenses and fill his jail to capacity. The
parish is then obligated to pay for those prisoners and, because the $3.50
per diem is a minimum amount, the sheriff can eventually insist the rate be
raised so he can keep the facility running.

Because paying for the keeping of local inmates is a mandated expense, the
parishes could be left holding a bag.

"It will be a gigantic problem for us," Lyons says. "Already feeding and
keeping of prisoners in jail is one of the biggest expenses the parishes have."

Already, a few parishes have taken action to protect their budgets. Caddo
Sheriff Steve Prator sued his parish government after it reduced funding to
the Sheriff's Department by more than $600,000 because he was bringing in
funds from housing state inmates. The two sides settled the dispute.

In Webster Parish, the police jury is suing Sheriff Ted Riser for
transferring local prisoners to other parishes. The jury was being billed
$23 per day for those prisoners and, they alleged, the sheriff should have
sent state prisoners they wouldn't be financially responsible for. The
sheriff argued he had to move the prisoners because the facility they were
staying in was overcrowded.

The Growing Storm

Last year, as the state's economy began to sag, legislators approved
reducing the amount paid for each state prisoner from $23 per day to
$22.39. That 61-cent decrease hit parish and local jails hard especially
when looked at in context, Rives says.

The national average per diem for states paying to house inmates in local
jails is $27.50. In addition, the state pays private prisons almost $43 per
day when you add up all the funding sources, Rives says.

"We are doing them a big favor," Belt says. "But they are treating us like
a redheaded stepchild."

More bad tidings arrived in June when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that
illegal aliens couldn't be held indefinitely. Almost a third of the foreign
nationals being held by the Immigration and Naturalization Service were
released, including many in Louisiana.

The federal government pays almost double the state rate for housing INS
prisoners. The loss of that income put sheriff's departments like the one
in Avoyelles Parish in dire straits.

"We looked at our options and we had to do layoffs," Belt says. "Personnel
is your largest cost. We are cutting back to bare bones to get ourselves
back in the black."

Other sheriffs are trying to lure prisoners from other states to their
jails as a way to fill the empty beds. Currently, no out-of-state prisoners
are being held in Louisiana jails, and it's unlikely the situation will
change soon.

While the number of people confined in jails and prisons nationally has
reached an unprecedented total of 1.33 million, the 1.1 percent increase
over last year's total is the smallest in three decades. Moreover, in the
past five years, prison and jail construction across the country has boomed.

The result has been fewer states with extra inmates to fill out-of-state
beds. Currently, Hebert says, only five states are actively looking for
help housing their inmate population: Wisconsin, Vermont, Alabama, Hawaii
and Arizona.

"Trust me. I've been looking everywhere I can find," he says.

Reversing A Trend

And, even though state prisoners are at a premium today, they could become
even more difficult for local jails to find in the future.

In 1998, after years of lagging behind Texas, Louisiana gained the dubious
distinction of having the highest incarceration rate in the country. It has
not let go of the lead since. Currently there are eight prisoners behind
bars for every 1,000 people living in the state.

Critics note that the large number of inmates behind bars has done little
to offset the crime rate. The Federal Bureau of Investigation statistics
for 2000, the most recent year available, show the state's crime rate has
fallen for the third straight year. But the 54.23 total crimes for each
1,000 residents is still the fourth highest rate in the nation.

"At some point we had to ask, what is our goal? Is it to maximize
incarceration or maximize public safety?" Stalder says. "Clearly, it is to
maximize public safety."

Last year, the State Legislature approved a gamut of new sentencing
guidelines aimed at limiting the number of people behind bars. The bills
that eventually passed repeal mandatory sentencing for many nonviolent
crimes, allow a review of some drug possession cases and create a new
sentence review mechanism to aid some prisoners seeking probation or parole.

"It's not likely that any of this is going to happen at once," Foster says.
"The dam isn't going to burst all of a sudden and drown us all in a slew of
suddenly released inmates."

Not only does reducing the number of state inmates make financial sense, it
also is a more logical way of seeing the right people are behind bars, says
State Sen. Donald Cravins, D-Arnaudville.

"The Legislature ought not be in the sentencing business," he says. "Let's
give some of the latitude back to the judges and start redirecting people
out of the system who don't need to be there."

So, as the state tries to cap the total number of inmates, the number of
total beds in local jails continues to increase. By 2006, current
construction projects should put the total number of beds available at
39,100. For a system strapped to the limit, that could be the critical
point, experts say. The state is also planning to construct specialized
facilities that will include more than 1,400 beds for violent offenders,
prisoners with mental handicaps and trusty programs.

Even worse news for local jails is if the Legislature begins discussing
lowering the per diem even further, an option Cravins says is not without
merit.

"We are high and dry with our budget right now so we are looking at every
available option at our disposal," he says. "The bottom line is this is
state funding for a parish responsibility."

Dwindling Options

Many sheriffs looking for new ways to ensure they will have full beds have
found a different tactic - get a new type of bed.

Several parishes have begun building work release facilities. The state
only pays $18 per day for each inmate in these programs, but the parish can
make up the difference by taking a portion of the prisoners' pay. The lower
fee makes the program attractive to the state and the smaller number of
participating facilities to compete against has made it attractive to the
sheriffs.

The overhead for keeping the prisoners is less expensive for a number of
reasons. Because most of the prisoners on work release are at the end of
their sentences and are continually screened, security is not as severe a
problem. And, as a rehabilitative program, work release should have a
long-term benefit of helping to keep inmates from winding up back in prison.

Currently, there are 11 work release centers statewide housing 1,335
prisoners. Already plans are being made to expand those centers to house an
additional 85 prisoners and other parishes are considering trying the program.

Lafayette Parish Sheriff Mike Neustrom says his department has begun
looking at the possibility of bringing such a program to the Hub City after
seeing the success of other parishes such as Iberia. The Lafayette area
boasts the key element of such a program - having a number of available
jobs that inmates could perform.

"As this (inmate) population continues to go down, we have to look at other
options," he says. "It makes sense economically to look at other ways to
generate money."

But work release is only a temporary measure. Such a program can only hold
so many prisoners, and many rural parishes who don't have many companies
that are able to hire inmates can't start one at all.

So, for now, the Monday morning frenzy will continue. And, despite the
specter of a shrinking budget, some remain sanguine about the future.

"It is a cycle," Belt explains. "Eventually you will see more of the
numbers level off and slowly increase. The trick is surviving long enough
for it all to come back around."