The California Fix

PRISON CUTS EASIER SAID THAN DONE

Fear and Mistrust Stymic Lawmakers's Bid to Trim $1.2 Billion. Some
Worry About Looking Soft on Crime.

California lawmakers signed off last month on deep cuts to education,
healthcare and welfare that many said they could scarcely have
imagined in years past. But when it came time last week to address
the state's overcrowded prison system -- an area where the Democrats
who control the Legislature have long pushed for change -- they froze.

State prisons, criticized as unwieldy and inefficient by experts in
California and across the country, have in recent years become the
most sacred area of state government, seemingly impervious to
transformation because of politics, fear and mistrust.

"You have an absolute hysteria," Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los
Angeles) said last week. Crime and corrections, she said, are "a
visceral issue."

With federal courts this month ordering the state to reduce the
prison population by 40,000 inmates, a budget crisis that makes it
crucial for the state to do so and a major riot recently at a crowded
Chino lockup, the likelihood of relieving pressure and saving money
at California's correctional institutions has appeared higher than ever.

When state leaders reached a budget deal last month, prisons were the
only area of government on which they could not agree how to make the
necessary cuts -- $1.2 billion. On Thursday, the state Senate,
without a vote to spare, approved a controversial package to fill in
the details.

Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and other supporters say the
plan would refocus resources on California's most violent criminals,
as other states have done, and reduce the number of low-level
offenders churning in and out of expensive prison cells, cutting the
inmate population by 37,000 over two years. It would also create a
commission to reexamine state sentencing laws.

But in the Assembly, Bass could not round up enough votes from wary
Democrats, at least 16 of whom are waging bids for higher office --
including three for attorney general -- that could be hampered if
they were seen as soft on crime. With letters, phone calls and
personal entreaties at the Capitol, local law enforcement
representatives were lobbying lawmakers against the bill, hoping to defeat it.

Legislators listened to attack lines from Republicans: "Mayhem on the
streets," Sen. Jeff Denham (R-Atwater) predicted. And Senate GOP
leader Dennis Hollingsworth of Murrieta said the changes would let
"bad people" take away Californians' life, liberty and property.

One senator invoked the name of Lily Burk, the Los Angeles teenager
slain last month, even though corrections officials say the suspected
killer, a parolee, would have received more scrutiny under the plan
because he had a record of violence.

So Bass said she would try again Monday with a slimmed-down package.

Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-Torrance), who is running for attorney
general against fellow Assemblymen Alberto Torrico (D-Newark) and
Pedro Nava (D-Santa Barbara), opposed the measures. He described as
"early release" a provision that would allow some inmates to serve
the last year of their term on home detention with electronic
monitoring. In an interview, Lieu said his bid to become the state's
chief law enforcer had nothing to do with his stance on the plan.

"Forget about healthcare, environment or education policy," Lieu
said. "If people are not safe or don't feel safe, then government has failed."

Assemblyman Warren Furutani (D-Gardena) said that problems in prisons
are important "institutional issues" but that they pale beside the
public safety implications of releasing criminals into neighborhoods,
"where the rubber meets the road."

The number of inmates in California's prison system has skyrocketed,
from 76,000 in 1988 to nearly 170,000 today, with the advent of
tough-on-crime measures such as the three-strikes law and
increasingly harsh sentences imposed by lawmakers. Over the last
decade, spending has more than doubled, from $4.7 billion in 2000 to
$10.8 billion in the fiscal year that ended in June.

Over the years, the main impetus for change in prisons has been
pressure from inmates' lawyers backed by the federal courts, which
took control of a prison healthcare system they judged to be
unconstitutionally deficient. Many experts have recommended ways to
improve the prisons without significantly impairing public safety,
but those suggestions have been swallowed by Sacramento's political vortex.

Schwarzenegger made fixing the prison system a priority in his first
term, reorganizing the California Department of Corrections and
adding the word "Rehabilitation" to its name. But critics said too
little money followed to rehabilitate prisoners, and some of that
funding is being cut now.

The governor several times proposed scaling back the state parole
system, one of the nation's most stringent. But he has been unable to
win support from legislators and law enforcement groups and in the
past has backed away. Now, however, he has staunchly advocated the
plan approved by the Senate.

He called on Democrats last week to exercise political courage on an
issue he said was "politically risky." And he criticized Republicans
who asked for more time on the issue: "We are losing total control
over the system and people say, 'What is the rush?' "

Many experts say less serious offenders belong in county jails or on
probation, where they may have family support systems nearby and a
better chance to turn their lives around. County and city law
enforcement officials have expressed willingness to take those
prisoners, but they don't believe the state would provide funding for
the added burden.

"The lack of trust about money is really interfering with great
criminal justice policy in the state," said Jeanne Woodford, a former
San Quentin State Prison warden and a corrections secretary under
Schwarzenegger.

At least one local law enforcement group, the California State
Sheriffs' Assn., does not oppose putting some state prisoners on home
detention, an "alternative custody" approach that counties use with
their own inmates. But in a letter Thursday, the association asked
that state leaders reconsider proposals that would reduce penalties
for some crimes and send those offenders to county jails instead of prison.

County lockups "are facing their own overcrowding crisis," the letter said.

Nick Warner, legislative director for the sheriffs' association, said
they understand that if the state doesn't take action soon, the
federal courts will. The judges in the prison case could order the
state to implement parts of the package that is now before lawmakers
or to release prisoners and limit admissions. They have said they
would delay such plans pending an appeal of their ruling, however,
which would probably keep the budgetary pressure on state officials.

Warner, citing the tough decisions to be made, said: "We'd like to
help the legislators and the governor make reasoned choices in a way
that is workable and manageable -- even if they are not good choices."