CROWDED JAILS ARE A GROWING PROBLEM

Tough sentencing policies have begun to turn the tide against crime in
Tennessee and across the nation.

But many jails are overcrowded and outdated. And, with the inmate
population continuing to swell, the situation is becoming critical.

It is against this bleak backdrop that the Tennessee Department of
Correction is proposing to cut the amount it pays local jails. The proposed
change would place a $35 per day limit on the amount the state pays for
housing state prisoners who are serving one-to six-year sentences.

The department calculates the measure would save the state approximately
$30 million -- a "savings" local jails will be left to absorb. We can only
hope that other departments of state government won't utilize similar
tactics. The combined "savings" might bankrupt localities.

Cutting state funding for jail inmates comes at a time when Tennessee's
criminal population is predicted to increase substantially. A report issued
last year by the department of correction itself estimated that the state's
inmate population will increase 30 percent in the next decade. There are
roughly 22,000 men and 1,500 women incarcerated in state prisons, not
counting state inmates serving time in local jails.

A healthy number of inmates at most jails are state prisoners being held
here because the state has no room for them. In recent years, it's grown
increasingly clear state lawmakers are more interested in passing popular
laws that promise to lock criminals away than adequately funding the state
prison system. Local jails have become the dumping grounds for state criminals.

If state lawmakers don't soon find the money to address Tennessee's growing
prison population, the only real option left is to release convicts on an
accelerated basis to free up space for the next batch.