Mass Incarceration | OP-ED
Dianne Post, National Lawyers Guild
Legal Redress, Maricopa County NAACP
16 February 2012
For years Arizona has relied on mass incarceration as its primary criminal justice response. That reliance is ineffective, inefficient, inhumane and discriminatory. The NAACP opposes the continuance of mass incarceration and the building of prisons, especially private, for-profit prisons, as the lynchpin of Arizona’s criminal justice policy.
The State has spent millions and wants to spend millions more for prisons. In 2009 the legislature passed a law to build 5,000 more private, for-profit prison beds that would cost taxpayers $640 million by 2017 though the inmate population and crime is decreasing. The Department of Corrections (DOC) budget is $1 billion or 11% of the state’s total budget. While other states are bringing their budgets down in this time of austerity, Arizona’s keeps going up.
The increasing criminalization of our society by these policies means that one in one hundred persons is arrested; more teens are tried as adults, we incarcerate at a higher rate and more people than any country including China and Russia, and the majority of those inmates are Black and Brown. The highest imprisonment rate is Black males. Counting men over 18, for white’s the rate is one in 106 is arrested, for Hispanic one in 36, for Blacks one in 15, for Blacks ages 20-34, it is one in nine.
The discrimination crosses gender lines as well. For white women, the rate is one in 355, for Hispanic one in 297, and for Blacks it is one in 100. The states with the most prison inmates, the highest rate of and the highest growth of private for-profit prisons is in the South and Arizona.
The state tries to hide the tremendous cost of these prisons by contracting with private, for-profit prisons that are not accountable to the public in the same way as the state institutions rather than requiring voters to approve capital expenditures at a time when our coffers are dry. But private prisons do not save money. Private prisoners cost on average $56 per day per prisoner while the state’s cost $48. The ADOC Maximus study done in 2007 found that when the savings and costs were totaled from all the private prisons, privatization was costing the state $343,237 annually. In Kingman alone, the net loss for the state was $1,443,685. In 2009, in a report by the DOC, FY2009 Operating Per Capita Cost Report, February 11, 2010, the daily per capita cost of a publicly run prison was $46.97 and the for-profit prisons were $47.20. Arizona is losing money by privatizing. Mass incarceration is a boondoggle for large corporations who suck taxpayer dollars out of necessary programs to pay their inflated salaries.
Private prisons are not safe. The escape from the GEO prison in Kingman brought to light a multitude of problems at the prison, but when ADOC ordered them to fix it, they sued the state and taxpayers paid another $3 million – for subpar performance. Inmate on inmate violence is 66% higher and violence to staff is 49% higher in private prisons.
Private prisons do not bring jobs or economic development. The corporations that run the prisons are not local and buy in bulk from a central out of state purchaser. They often bring in their own construction from planning to finish because they just repeat the process. The institutions in Arizona have already been fined e.g. those in Kingman, Marana, Phoenix West and Florence West because they failed to fill vacancies. But the Kingman prison is busy taking jobs from local city staff by hiring out inmates at less.
Bills have been introduced to require private prisons to meet the same standard as state prisons e.g. to notify the state of threats to public health and safety (like the Kingman escape), prohibit transfer of serious or violent offenders from other states,
make their records public since the public is paying the bills, and have state monitoring and oversight. (HB 2002-2006, 2299) But the committee chair, Rep Weiers won’t even let the bills be heard. Who is he representing? Private corporations or the taxpayers?
Decades of research have shown that prisons do not bring economic development. In fact since 1990, a prison in a town reduces jobs overall and drives down wages. Up to two-thirds of the potential tax revenue and economic benefit leaves the host community. Prisons do not bring in other kinds of development such as tourism or housing.
At least half of all prisoners are non-violent drug offenders. They need treatment not prison. The Innocence Project has proven repeatedly that many incarcerated Blacks were falsely convicted. Prison should be for violent criminals who need rehabilitation or who can never be rehabilitated. It should not be a profit-making venture for large corporations.
Some sensible bills have been introduced this year if the committee chair (David Gowan) would only hear them. HB 2521 would allow nonviolent offenders to earn increased release credit and thus give them an incentive to get out early, saving taxpayers and helping families and communities. One policy driving our high incarceration rate is mandatory sentencing. One size does not fit all but the current procedure leads to lengthy sentences that cost the taxpayers and wreck families and communities. HB 2522 would resolve that. Another harm to families is the $25 charge for visits. While at first blush, it seems a good idea to help fund the prisons, in the long term it is harmful. Inmates who do not keep in touch with families are more likely to return to prison thus costing the community and taxpayers more in the long run. HB 2523 would remedy this. HB2531 allows the director of the DOC to parole inmates whose physical disabilities have incapacitated them, so that they are no longer a threat to the safety of the public.
Arizona must re-think its criminal justice system and institute reforms in the best interest of the entire state, not just a few corporate shareholders or office holders. Mass incarceration of citizens, especially for profit, is a betrayal of our democratic ideals. Let’s get back on track.
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Dianne Post |
| Phoenix, AZ |
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