http://www.ocregister.com/commentary/ Wednesday, June 19, 2002 Guard our budget from prison spending As California's government faces a budget crisis, Gov. Gray Davis (and, to be fair, most legislators) are avoiding studiously one department where budget cuts would be good public policy and popular with voters. Instead, the administration is moving ahead with plans to increase spending on prisons and boost the salaries of prison guards. This defies ordinary fiscal logic. On the other hand it may reflect short-term political calculation. The California Correctional Peace Officers Association, the prison guards' union, has been especially generous with campaign contributions to Gov. Davis and other California politicians. Since 1998 the CCPOA has given about $450,000 in direct contributions to Gov. Davis, and hosted a golf tournament that raised another $356,000. In 2000 alone the union donated about $1.9 million to California politicians of both parties, including at least $93,000 to Senate President Pro Tem John Burton of San Francisco. Sen. Burton, considered a liberal sympathetic to reform efforts including prison reform, is carrying the bill to ratify the prison guards' new union contract, agreed to in January by the Davis administration. Over five years that contract will increase the highest salary for a prison guard from $54,888 to $73,426 and tie guard salaries permanently to California Highway Patrol salaries (which are also scheduled to increase). The contract is likely to cost California taxpayers about $1 billion over five years. The governor, having agreed to close some non-union private prisons, a key union demand, is also still pushing ahead on a proposal to build a new $595 million prison near Delano. It all looks like mutual political back-scratching with the taxpayers' money. If new prisons were needed that would be one thing. But California's prison population has actually declined slightly in the last couple of years. The Legislative Analyst's Office recently determined that the Corrections Department had overestimated next year's prison population by 2,266. And a recent poll found that 58 percent of California voters favor a moratorium on prison construction. Republican governors in Ohio, Illinois, Michigan and Florida have confronted budget crises by closing prisons. Rather than building more prisons, state officials would do well to improve prisons now in operation, which is more a matter of attitude than money. At warden confirmation hearings held in the Senate the week before last, medical personnel noted the poor medical care in most prisons and criticized the efforts of one warden to buy an expensive and unneeded dialysis machine rather than to improve inexpensive day-to-day care. More detailed, documented criticism of several wardens from Cayenne Bird, director of the prisoner-family reform organization UNION, was met with derision or criticism. None of the senators seemed interested in the amount of money taxpayers pay out in lawsuits due to incompetent wardens or guards. In 1999 (the last year for which complete figures are available) the $15.5 million budgeted for lawsuits and settlements ran out three months before the fiscal year ended and the request for 2000-2001 was almost $40 million, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. All the wardens were confirmed in a display of business as usual. With a $23 billion-plus deficit facing the state, however, it should not be business as usual. The legislature should impose a moratorium on prison construction, delay implementation of the prison guards' contract, and investigate conditions at California prisons aggressively. It should implement the money-saving reforms suggested by the Legislative Analyst's Office - including early release of nonviolent prisoners, work-time credits and discharge without parole for nonviolent offenders - which the LAO estimates would save about $360 million a year. In a budget crisis taxpayers should expect no less.
Guard Union Articles To: letters@latimes.com
The editorial on the overtime pay for the prison guards only pointed out one major flaw in the contract with their union (CCPOA). It doesn't mention the guards will get $73,000 base pay, no requirement to demonstrate physical condition, and retirement at age 50. No mention is made of the $2.5 million it donated to Davis before last year and no nor the huge amount of money to other legislators. What about money donated to defeat an incumbent DA who tried Corcoran State Prison prison guards accused of instigating fights between rival gang inmates. It also fails to note that the former head of the CCPOA union is now involved with the Indian tribes to expand the casinos. The only way to curb the abuse of money in this instance is to enact
legislation forbidding public service unions from donating to those who
are responsible for their pay and benefits. As it stands
Bob D Comments: The editorial also does not mention that much of this overtime is "created"
by the guards through
Each time a "lockdown" is declared, about 4000 cells must be searched (ransacked is a better word). This process of searching one prison can take up to six weeks. Then they are locked down until the searching is finished. The inmates are then let out of lockdown for a short period, the guards "create" another reason to lock them down again and the six week cell searching process begins again. Putting two men in a room the size of a bathroom for days, weeks, years on end with a COLD shower allowed every 3 days makes the men mentally distraught. They are allowed out of their cells for only one hour and often this is skipped. Court cases fall through the cracks, no boxes, no visits, no classes, no cafeteria, no canteen, and the risk of violence or even death because medical and dental treatment become even more restricted. Lockdown is hell, it's purpose is to create overtime for the guards 90% of the time. Let us keep in mind who is in prison. Less than 30% are there for violent crimes and most of these are severely mentally ill. Our money is not spent to keep "murderers and rapists" under control - it is spent to torment mentally ill, frail elderly, 16,000 people charged and convicted of simple possession, and people who stole food and received a life sentence. This reality is unclear to the LA Times editorial writer, but your constant letters will bring it into focus when enough people tell the truth... Look into "hazard pay" rates.
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