J. Pepper Bryars: Alabama must build more prisons but taxpayers don’t have to foot the bill
Vicious assault. Brutal rape. Cold-blooded murder. These are some of the crimes that will get you thrown into prison, but what if they’re also what could happen to you once you get there? Sadly, a federal investigation found this is happening in Alabama’s prison system, and part of the problem is we’ve simply run out of room. “Our investigation revealed that an excessive amount of violence, sexual abuse, and prisoner deaths occur within Alabama’s prisons on a regular basis,” wrote the authors of the report from the U.S. Department of Justice, adding that that one of the major factors is “severe overcrowding” and that the state doesn’t “provide adequate humane conditions of confinement.” “These are human beings,” said one mother of an inmate who was repeatedly threatened with violence at the state prison near Atmore. “I feel like our society is getting too numb when it comes to human lives.” Alabama’s prison system was designed for about 9,900 inmates but it’s currently holding more than 16,000 – an occupancy rate of more than 165 percent, according to data published by the Alabama Department of Corrections. It gets worse in some places. The investigation found that the medium-security prison in Elmore County was at 272 percent occupancy, holding nearly 1,400 inmates in a facility designed to hold about 500. And Kilby Correctional Facility outside Montgomery was designed to hold 440 but currently has more than three times that amount. While some were shocked by the details shared in the federal report and the graphic pictures from inside our prisons that were leaked to the press, others remain unconcerned. Alabama is a law-and-order state whose people believe in the adage that “if you do the crime, you do the time.” And a recent survey from the Public Affairs Research Council of Alabama found that a slight majority of us disagree with plans to build more prisons. But here’s the problem: if Alabama doesn’t get its act together than a federal court has said it may find us in violation of the Eighth Amendment and will force us to release thousands of these inmates before their sentences are complete. Do we really want that to happen? Of course not, and that’s why the Alabama Policy Institute has begun organizing with a coalition of concerned individuals and organizations who seek to promote, among other reforms, the construction of three new state-of-the-art prisons. The Ivey Administration released plans earlier this year calling for one facility to be a centralized location for medical and mental health care, housing for older inmates, and where prisoners first enter the system. It could house nearly 4,000 inmates. The other two would hold a little more than 3,000 prisoners each. Here’s the best part: Under the plan as currently proposed we wouldn’t have to raise taxes. Estimates show it’d cost $900 million, but through a creative public-private partnership, developers would fund construction up-front and then the state would lease the facilities for up to $78 million annually. That money would come from savings realized by consolidating services and closing old facilities that are expensive to maintain. “Alabama truly does have a major problem with our overcrowding of our prisons,” Gov. Kay Ivey said. “And it’s a challenge we Alabamians must solve, not the federal courts.” This plan would go a long way in meeting not only our constitutional responsibilities but our moral obligations, as well. The vast majority of Alabamians profess to be Christians, and as written in the thirteenth chapter of Hebrews, we’re called to be “as mindful of prisoners as if you were sharing their imprisonment.” When our State Legislature convenes early next year for what’s expected to be a special session to address prison reform, Alabamians should ask ourselves if we are honestly living up to that standard. And if we aren’t, it’s time to do something about it. J. Pepper Bryars is a senior fellow at the Alabama Policy Institute and host of the 1819 podcast. Follow him on Twitter at @jpepperbryars.
Scott Beason: Squeaky wheels
The regular session of the Alabama Legislature is over and some folks in our state are looking at the lack of a General Fund budget as a failure of the legislative branch of government. Keep in mind that the Legislature, in passing a General Fund budget, fulfilled its constitutional responsibility, but the passed budget was vetoed by the governor. The Legislative Session should be seen as a victory for responsible budgeting, fiscal responsibility, and economic viability for Alabama. Conservative members of the Legislature held the line on tax increases and should be commended for doing so. (There was the hiccup of allowing hundreds of state fees to be raised considerably by bureaucrats, but that is a discussion for another day.) While groups such as the Alabama Free Market Alliance worked to inform the residents of the state about what was happening in Montgomery, the real reason behind the Legislature not passing taxes increases was that the people let their voices be heard. The old adage that the squeaky wheel gets the grease is very true in politics. An elected official who only hears from one side of the debate begins to believe that the other side must not care very much, and it gets easier to vote the way of the squeaky wheel. Entities that live off government, including the beneficiaries of corporate welfare, squeak loudly. Many times taxpayers focus on their lives and just hope for the best. This spring taxpayers spoke up some and good legislators held the line. Taxpayers have more work to do. A Special Session will likely take place this summer. The proper philosophy of budgeting is to prioritize spending according to money the state has. Unfortunately, the bigger-government crowd has a philosophy of budgeting that decides what they want to do and then set out to forcibly extract enough money from the people to pay for their wish list. Which philosophy does your legislator believe in? Let’s enjoy a brief victory, and let our conservative legislators know how much we appreciate them holding the line on taxes. Let’s hope other legislators will join the conservatives and do the budget reforms that Alabama needs: abandon earmarks, unify the budgets, and prioritize spending. A little more squeezing might actually foster a big win later this summer. Scott Beason is senior policy adviser at the Alabama Free Market Alliance.
