STATE NEEDS MORE PRISON CAPACITY AND SENTENCING REFORM

Here's the problem: Alabama has 28,000 inmates in state prisons that
were built to house fewer than half that number.

The state is under at least two court orders to reduce prison
crowding. However, it doesn't have the money to build new prisons and
new revenue for the Department of Corrections is not a priority with
either the Legislature or the voters.

The state has two options. It can continue the program to speed up
paroles of non-violent inmates, initiated as a desperation measure by
Gov. Bob Riley. Or it can put in place a comprehensive program of
alternative sentencing laws.

This is not rocket science. The sooner Alabama adopts alternative
sentencing, the better. The stream of early parolees has begun to
concern local law enforcement officers in Tuscaloosa and many other
parts of the state. Given the circumstances, it may have to continue
for a while. Yet it can't go on indefinitely.

The groundwork for alternative sentencing already has been laid. The
state Sentencing Commission has spent the past four years studying
Alabama's laws and working on alternatives.

Some of the commission's work is controversial. For example, it
continues to wrestle with the problem of reforming Alabama's drug laws.

The prosecutors, judges and state leaders on the commission agree that
a change is needed. The state spends around $4 million annually to
incarcerate drug offenders who would not go to prison if convicted of
the same violations in neighboring states.

In Alabama, a first conviction for possession of marijuana for
personal use is a misdemeanor; a second conviction is an automatic
felony, regardless of amount of marijuana in possession. Forty percent
of the state's drug felons go to prison. Yet in Virginia, only people
who sell marijuana face felony charges.

Some Alabama district attorneys feel that raising the felon threshold
for marijuana possession would send the wrong message of the state's
young people. Proponents for changing the law say that sending people
to prison is not solving the drug problem.

Yet both sides agree that Alabama's severe drug sentences contribute
significantly to our state's incarceration rate, the fifth highest in
the country. In 2002, Alabama had 612 inmates per 100,000 residents,
far above the national average of 476 per 100,000.

Agreement on a drug reform recommendation to the Legislature is
unlikely this year, and other components of a coherent alternative
sentencing program remain to be endorsed by the commission. However,
lawmakers this year are looking at five bills that the commission has
recommended, three of them dealing with fees and fines.

One of the measures, which would increase authorized fines on some
felony offenses by 300 percent, could produce more than $1 million in
new revenues for the underfunded state criminal justice system.

That kind of money is needed to help underwrite other sentencing
commission recommendations like expanding community corrections
programs to relieve the pressure on state prisons.

State Corrections Commissioner Donal Campbell endorses this program,
which keeps nonviolent offenders locked up in their communities with a
chance to work and pay off their incarceration and financial
obligations.

This program is not cheap, but it can be implemented for a fraction of
the cost of sending an inmate to state prison. Studies have shown,
moreover, that it is much more successful than prison-based programs
in preventing a recurrence of criminal activity.

Alabama still needs more prison capacity, Campbell said, but it also
needs sentencing reform. The Legislature should make that reform a
priority, supported with strong recommendations from a unified
sentencing commission.