November 2, 2010 | 4:25 PM | By

Where the candidates stand on prison reform

FILED UNDER: Politics, Elections, Jerry Brown, Kamala Harris, Meg Whitman, Steve Cooley

As a recent Sacramento Bee editorial put forth, if you’re looking for a statewide candidate who embraces full-on prison reform in this election, you’re going to be disappointed. The candidates have mostly steered clear of making any promises or plans for changing the state’s overcrowded and heavily scrutinized prison system, or taking on the state’s high recidivism rate. Yet the candidates do display subtle differences.

Jerry Brown

Is heavily supported by the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, which has produced a number of commercials for the candidate. He says the state needs sentencing reforms that revise some of the mandatory minimums that are currently in place. As Attorney General, he’s fought the federal court-ordered reforms to the prison system and has not been interested in negotiating with the federal receiver to reduce the prison population.

Meg Whitman

Has said that the state should look into options like private prisons and sending inmates to other states to reduce prison overcrowding. She also supports building new prisons. Whitman does not support creating a sentencing commission to look into mandatory minimum sentences. She’s indicated that pensions for correctional officers might be reduced under a Whitman administration.

Kamala Harris

Has put forth the most progressive (or radical, depending on how you look at it) stance on prison reform. Namely, in the attorney general candidates debate, she said that California must comply with a ruling by a panel of federal judges that said the state needs to reduce its prison population. (The case goes before the US Supreme Court later this month.) She’s also put forth plans to

Steve Cooley

In the past, Cooley has been outspoken on issues like California’s Three-Strikes sentencing law, saying that it’s too often used to put non-serious offenders in prison for life. In recent times, he’s backed off a bit, saying that prosecutors have come around and are mostly sticking to the law’s intent. Cooley has also pledged to fight the prison system’s court-ordered reforms as ardently as possible.

  • Richmck

    About 48,500 prison beds are occupied by offenders serving brief sentences of four to six months is prison only because of a 65,000 county jail bed shortage. Technical parole violators occupy almost 19,000 beds and “wobblers”, offenders who can serve their brief sentences either in county jail or prison, occupy almost 30,000 beds. If the county jail shortage were eliminated, the prison bed shortage would be eliminated. The county jail shortage could be eliminated at a savings of $1.5 billion in annual prison operating costs by using contract facilities. That strategy would also avoid spending $19.5 billion for prison bed construction at $300,000 per bed. Additionally, the State could save over $410 million annually by just fixing a broken parole revocation system. That would also avoid spending $2.8 billion for prison construction. The solution is not complicated but the politics are!

  • Pray4Peace

    Building more prisons and sending people to for-profit, corporate prisons (sometimes called contract-bed) is not economically sustainable.

    That would not relieve the overcrowding and is simply kicking the can down the road for the next group of politicians. Built it, and they will fill it. We need real reform and solutions like a sentencing commission. The unreasonably long sentences are not deterrents to crime and are bankrupting us and making the for-profit prison corporations rich.

    California prisons are not working. We have the highest recidivism rate the in whole nation. We need criminal justice, sentencing, and prison overhauls.

  • loveheals

    We will continue to be in CRISIS mode in our state and we will not prosper until we deal with the criminal acts, we the state are allowing to happen inside of our prisons every single day. In our names with our money” for-profit” lawmakers who pander to special interest (private prisons, companies benefiting from PIA and the prison guard union CCPOA) are committing crimes against humanity.

    California Dept of Corrections overcrowding is at a deathly level for all of us! As of today November 7, 2010 Sierra Conservation Center in Jamestown California is violating the law by having so many inmates inside that prison that there are inmates in cells, in gyms and now there are inmates on the floor in the dayrooms and the hallways because there is “literally” no more room! This prison is already in violation of air flow in the building causing disease, mold and death. They have been ordered to take care of these problems and they refuse. When inmates try to get help they are tortured and guards entice other inmates to retailiate. Riots are being created by guards. Inmates being forced to cell with any race but their own causing deaths. THESE problems cause diseases that are carried out to the public, THESE problems cause inmates to become ill and with the improper medical care some will and HAVE died, THESE problems are forcing riots & violating the constitutional rights of every Californian.

    The conditions inside of our prisons puts us all in danger and the answer is not to build more prisons or send them out of state because eventually we will have no more room anywhere. And when a citizen is sent to prison to pay their time to society it is our job as a state to do all we can to rehabilitate that person. If you were sent to prison because you got a DUI (no one was hurt) and you had one year and in that year you were forced to fight for basic human rights, were put in a cell with a man who may want to harm you if only for your race and had to fight for your life, got sick because of the mold in the buildings where you were housed and then you were unable to get medical attention and after all of that happens you are thrown back onto the streets. Odds are that person will come out of prison and reoffend and probably go back to prison on a worse offense.

    WE have created a human warehousing monsters. We must look to solutions to reduce the population by taking a REAL look at each prison and house them properly, let out those people that have done 20+ years and have been deamed rehabilitated by the parole board, stop our District Attorney offices from abusing 3 strikes and give that whole issue a re-do, find a solution for our aged and sick prisoners (do we really need hunderds of guards at $80K per year to watch sick and dying people?), and make a rehabiliation a reality and not just a word we added to the end of a department’s name.

    But the people must speak. Journalists must investigate & report – I find it odd that journalists cannot go into a prison to report on conditions or interview inmates but those Prison Guards sure do love to be seen on Lockup and other shows that glorify thier work. But how about what is under the surface. I guarantee you that it is disgusting and the department of Corrections is rotten to the core. We cannot trust them to handle this situation and can no longer let our futures and our childrens futures be ruined by taking money from our social services and schools to pay for prisons!

    With OUR money, the State of California is violating human rights and causing us to be put in danger by inmates coming our more dangerous, more frustrated & more sick then they ever were.