IOWA LAWMAKERS GET ADVICE FROM CRIMINAL JUSTICE PANEL ON HOW TO REDUCE
STATE PRISON EXPENSES

DES MOINES - Saving expensive prison beds for the worst criminals and
sending the rest through drug treatment or rehabilitation programs has
helped reduce prison populations around the country, corrections officials
from other states told Iowa lawmakers Monday.

A panel of criminal justice officials from Kansas and North Carolina, two
states that have stemmed the growth of their prison populations, shared
their states' successes at a joint House and Senate committee meeting. The
officials were invited as the Legislature considers reforming Iowa's
sentencing laws to address a booming prison population. Iowa's prison
system, with 8,516 inmates, is 25 percent over capacity.

Prison populations and spending on corrections programs are at historic
highs across the nation, with the U.S. prison population rising 75 percent
from 1990 to 2001. During that time, Iowa outpaced the national average,
seeing its prison population increase 119 percent.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Gene Maddox, R-Clive, said the state
will have to build another prison or do something to address overcrowding
before it faces either court action or sanctions from the federal government

"I think there is a limit of how far we can go without building one. I
would hope we could find ways to avoid it," he said.

Paul Morrison, a career prosecutor from Johnson County, Kan., said his
state curbed prison growth and made room for violent offenders by reducing
the length of prison terms for people convicted of property and drug
possession crimes.

In the past, he said, a large share of Kansas offenders were going to
prison, but not many were staying to serve long prison terms. "We had a
system that was predominantly full of low-grade property offenders, and
most of the people we need to really be afraid of weren't going to prison
for as long as they should," he said.

Instead, many of those less-serious offenders are sent through mandatory
drug treatment programs, which, he said, are far cheaper and have proven
successful.

"They need to have somebody baby-sit them. It's a lot cheaper than sending
them to prison," he added.

But Morrison warned legislators they could implement a program such as
Kansas only if they give adequate dollars to community corrections agencies.

"If you're not planning on funding these programs, don't pass them because
they will fail, he said.

North Carolina also leveled off its prison population by sending
less-serious offenders through community-based corrections programs rather
than to prison.

Robert Lee Guy, the director of that state's community corrections system,
said almost half of all felons are now diverted to community corrections
programs, such as house arrest, residential treatment or day reporting
instead of prison.

Before the reforms, a larger percentage of the state's felons were sent to
prison, but they were shuffled through the system more quickly, serving an
average of 16 months. Felons now serve an average prison term of 38 months.

Some states have taken decisive action to reduce the number of inmates in
their prison systems as they faced massive budget deficits. Kentucky
granted early release or parole to hundreds of inmates, and Michigan did
away with some mandatory minimum sentences.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Don Redfern, R-Cedar Falls, said it
would be challenging to find more money for community-based corrections,
but the policies the state is considering now could at least delay the need
for building a new prison.

"I think that where the kind of reforms we talk about today become so
important is as we look five, 15, 20 years out," he said.