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| Priorities: Big prisons, smart people? |
| By lompocrecord.com |
| Published: 12/17/2009 |
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California’s governor and lawmakers are dealing with a fiscal crisis. There’s not enough money to pay for the programs taxpayers have demanded in recent years, programs lawmakers have been only too willing to create, and governors to sign into law, in large part to curry favor with voters, so they could spend the maximum amount of time in office. If that sounds cynical, so be it. California has a long list of major problems to solve — not the least of which is setting priorities. For example, California has the nation’s largest and most expensive prison system, the “product” of which is a steady stream of recidivists. Those sent to prison go into the system, and an appallingly high percentage of them serve their sentences, get out on parole, and quickly break a law and end up back in prison. On the other hand, California has one of the nation’s largest and most expensive public higher-education systems in the nation. And while government pours more and more cash into building prisons to house newcomers and recidivists, it is taking more and more cash from the state’s three major higher-education systems because of budget deficits — part of which can be blamed on that hyper-costly prison system. Read More. |
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