P. A. MacLean
RedwoodAge.com

As prisoners age, states face soaring costs for their get-tough policies towards repeat offenders.

In California, 170,000 prisoners are crowded into prisons designed for half as many. (CDC)

Inmates under 50-years-old, for example, cost California $49,000 annually. But that price doubles for prisoners in their 50s,  and triples - to nearly $150,000 a year - for prisoners over 60, according to state Sen. Mark Leno.

"We've reached a point we spend more on corrections than higher education," the Democrat from San Francisco noted during a recent conference where he was addressing the crisis of overcrowding in the Golden State's prison system.

Like California, other states also have "three-strikes" laws that impose life terms for a repeat offender's third serious felony. However, only California sentences people to life for nonviolent, non-serious offenses. And it's problems serve as a harbinger for what may be facing other states that adopted strict sentencing rules designed to keep repeat offenders behind bars.

At a time when the Golden State's shine is tarnished by debt and sinking revenues, confinement of an aging inmate population may be up for reconsideration, despite the political sensitivities.

$9 Billion Failure
California has the largest prison system in the nation, with 170,000 inmates in 33 adult prisons. The state spends nearly $9 billion a year on prisons, jails and probation, according to Joan Petersilia, professor of criminology at the University of California, Irvine.  Overcrowded prisons are bursting at the bars, holding twice the capacity they were designed to house.

The state avoided confronting the mushrooming inmate population for years. Finally, two federal judges stepped in and ordered receivers to oversee reform of inmate medical and mental health care, which they said was so poor that it violated minimum constitutional standards.  The state is now appealing an order to reduce the population by 50,000 inmates.

During the same news conference where Leno spoke, Michael Jimenez, president of the state's 37,000-member prison guards' union, said his union backs a state sentencing commission to reform prison terms.

Lawmakers see "danger in being called soft on crime, but we are ready to say we will not run ads against people who stand up" for the sentencing commission, said Jimenez. "We can't overcome the gridlock [in the Legislature]. We need a sentencing commission."

In the past, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association has targeted politicians, district attorneys and a few trial judges, for defeat in elections when it disagreed with their policies or decisions. In some rural counties, where a prison is the largest employer, the union has the power to sway a local election.

Failed Attempts
Attempts to reform the state's patchwork of sentencing laws have failed nearly a dozen reform attempts dating back to 1984, including creation of a sentencing commission, according to Karen Dansky, executive director of Stanford University's Criminal Justice Center.

US District Judge Lawrence Karlton of the Eastern District of California is one of the judges overseeing prison mental health care. He is on the three-judge panel that ordered a reduction in inmate population. Karlton has presided for 14 years over a civil rights case attacking the adequacy of mental health care for prisoners. 

"In 1995, I found a violation of the Constitution due to the poor mental health care. And 14 years later, I am struggling to bring the prisons into compliance," he said. "Now I am dealing with the lack of a bed plan for the mentally ill in prison. Think about that, after 14 years there is no bed plan."

Although prisons remain costly for the state, fewer prisoners participate in relevant treatment programs compared to other states, according to Petersilia.  And while the state's recidivism rate is comparable to other states, only California's reimprisonment for technical parole violations are significantly higher.

Yet, 21 percent of California prisoners are classified as minimum risk.  And, at an average age of 36, California's inmates are older than the national average. 

Once released, the future remains bleak for many inmates.  The state releases 120,000 inmates a year and most are functionally illiterate and can be homeless within three years, according to Leno.

Though bills for a sentencing commission and other reforms have been proposed, Leno remained pessimistic.

"We are unequivocally, incapable of dealing with the issue of sentencing," he warned.