Rina Palta: ACLU: Counties Opting For Incarceration, Not Rehabilitation

Source:The FreeState 

California has so many people in their corrections system as far as inmates. And so many inmates that they are now under a court order to reduce the size of their inmate population. Not by accident because they arrest too many people. Fill up their prisons with inmates, basically just warehousing them. There are some exceptions and are left to wonder what to do with them once they reach overcrowding, for a State thats apparently as blue as California, That hasn’t voted Republican for President since 1988, they have a lot of “Bad Laws”, they simple incarcerate too many people who don’t represent a major threat to society. And after they do incarcerate these people, they don’t do a lot to prepare them for once they are released from prison.

California has what I would call a non-violent offender crisis. They incarcerate way too many people for drug abuse and drug obsession, when getting these people into drug rehab and halfway houses at their expense would save California taxpayers a lot of money. California had an opportunity to repeal one of their “Bad Laws” in 2010. To decriminalize marijuana and stop arresting people for use or possession of marijuana, which would’ve save their corrections system and Law enforcement billions of dollars, but that failed. 

And California is back where they started. But they could do things like drug rehab and halfway houses at the inmates expense. For Petty Offenders, people who are in prison for dumb mistakes. Like shoplifting and Drug Crimes. California could save its corrections system and law enforcement billions of dollars just with sentencing reform, keeping a lot of their non-violent Offenders out of prison and into halfway houses or drug rehab at the offenders expense. 

This would save California a lot of prison space for people who need to be there, putting their inmates to work and paying them so they can cover their cost of living and repealing their bad laws. And they would dramatically lower the size of their inmate population and still be able to protect the state.

Teshia Naidoo: Sane Drug Laws

Source:The FreeState

California is the perfect example of why and how the War on Drugs in America is stupid. This is a State thats swamped in debt, that still has double figure unemployment. That still has a high crime rate and one of the highest inmate populations per-capita in the country as well as the largest inmate population in numbers. They are also one of the highest taxed states, so if I was a Californian I would be asking why, I’m not getting much of a bang for my tax bucks.  

And yet California has been doing the same things for the last ten years. They recalled GOV. Grey Davis partially because of its debt issues and the economy wasn’t doing very well. Ten years later they are still facing the same problems and have even more people locked up in this State. If I was a Californian, I would want my State Government to look at what its doing. Admit the obvious finally and change course. Find ways to get more out of the taxes that Californians are forced to pay every year. And its corrections system, probably the most expensive in the Union, is a great first place to start and overhaul it.  

Start with the War on Drugs, stop arresting free adults for smoking or possessing marijuana. Stop sending heroin and cocaine addicts to prison and get them in drug rehab at their expense. Stop sending non-violent offenders to prison who don’t represent a major threat to society. And get them in halfway houses at their expense. Stop sending these people to prison and save the prisons for the offenders who need to be there. 

With GOV. Jerry Brown being a former Attorney General, he should know exactly how overcrowded their corrections system is and that it needs to be reformed and be more cost- effective. And hopefully he’ll put in the reforms to make that happen and save Californian Tax Payers billions of dollars.