Senate OKs Bill to Curb Cost of Prisons

Ambitious legislation designed to curb the soaring costs of state prisons by paying county sheriffs to keep nonviolent felony offenders in local jails won rare unanimous approval in the state Senate on Thursday.

The bipartisan 37-0 endorsement sent one of the session’s most important bills--SB 760, authored by Senate leader Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward)--to the Assembly, where Lockyer hopes it will “survive the minefields” of the strife-torn lower house and go on to be signed by Gov. Pete Wilson.

Lockyer warned that unless skyrocketing costs of incarcerating criminals are drastically reined in, other competing needs, such as the education of college students, will be sacrificed.

“Changing course won’t be easy,” he said, “but we have no other choice.”

Currently, about $3 billion is spent on state prisons each year, or about 8% of the state’s general fund. With the advent of the new “three strikes” sentencing law, which is aimed at repeat violent and other serious lawbreakers, and earlier get-tough measures, the state’s prison population is expected to soar. To keep up, spending on prisons is projected to increase 18% in the next eight years, according to a RAND Corp. study.

The California Department of Corrections estimates that at least 15 new prisons must be built in the next five years to house about 80,000 new convicts.

Proponents of the Lockyer plan contend that its enactment would head off the construction of five or six of the new prisons, saving more than $2 billion in construction costs alone.

Under the proposal, the state would pay its 58 counties a total of about $650 million a year to house nonviolent felons--such as drug addicts, burglars, drunk drivers and bad-check writers--who otherwise would be sent to state prison for terms of a year or less. Participation by counties would be voluntary.

Lockyer said the $650 million represents the amount the state would spend to house the nonviolent felons in its prisons.

The bill also would authorize counties who join the “partnership” with the state to establish penal facilities other than locked jails, including boot camps, probation camps and drug rehabilitation programs.

Lockyer said short-term felons could be housed in local facilities much less expensively than in state prison cells, where a typical convict costs taxpayers about $60 a day. The per-day cost at some local jails is $40, he said.

But some senators said they are concerned that many local jails are overcrowded and that some lockups, such as two in Los Angeles County, have been closed and inmates have been freed early because of a lack of operating funds.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Sherman Block recently praised the concept of the Lockyer bill as “worthy,” but warned the Legislature to give it “very careful and cautious review.” His concerns related to issues of parole, costs, funding and the legal powers of sheriffs.

Lockyer described his bill as an incomplete project that will be subject to extensive modifications in the Assembly, including agreement on a bond issue for next year’s ballot that would provide construction funds for local jail facilities.

“There are many areas that remain to be resolved,” Lockyer said.