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| California State Assembly Approves Prison Legislation |
| By nytimes.com |
| Published: 09/01/2009 |
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LOS ANGELES — The California State Assembly narrowly passed legislation on Monday to reduce the state prison population by 27,000 inmates and the state corrections budget by about $1 billion. After several hours of debate in Sacramento, the bill passed 41 to 35, without any Republican support and only about half of the Democratic majority. The bill was significantly weaker than a version that the State Senate passed last month. It will shorten sentences for some nonviolent prison inmates who participate in rehabilitation programs, reduce parole supervision for some infirm and nonviolent offenders, and increase monitoring for parolees with violent criminal records. Law enforcement groups played a central role in pushing Democrats to strip the bill of provisions that would have reduced sentences for some nonviolent offenses and would have established a public safety commission to redo prison sentencing guidelines. Those excised proposals reduced the savings of the bill for the strapped state by about $220 million, and the prison population reductions by about 11,000 inmates, said the speaker, Karen Bass, a Democrat who led negotiations last week to remove the provisions. Read More. |
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