PRESERVE DRUG TREATMENT

Our Position: It's Shortsighted To Cut Back On Drug Treatment For Prisoners.

A whopping 60 percent of Florida's 72,000 prison inmates are serving time
for offenses related to their alcohol or drug addictions. Taxpayers cough
up more than $2 million a day to keep that population imprisoned.

Effective treatment programs exist to address the problem, but Florida cut
them back severely last fall to balance the state budget.

It's regrettable that the Department of Corrections couldn't find a way to
preserve the programs. Spending money on drug treatment today saves money
in the future because inmates who complete treatment are less likely to end
up back in prison.

Gov. Jeb Bush and lawmakers should work with corrections officials to make
the restoration of those programs a priority. Although Mr. Bush proposes
restoring $5 million for community-based programs, his budget wouldn't
restore the $11 million spent on in-prison treatment.

Treatment isn't 100 percent effective, of course. But the success of
in-prison programs translates to at least 125 former inmates a year living
productive lives instead of ending up back in prison, which translates to a
base annual savings of $2.4 million for taxpayers. Multiply that times
sentences of six years or more and factor in the taxes paid by productive
citizens, and the wisdom of restoring the programs is clear.

Treating addicts in prison and after their release isn't just a nicety;
it's a necessity.