Smarter on Crime

Calif. Prison Woes Tracked in Newspaper’s Interactive Maps

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By Bernice Yeung | Crowdfund this with Spot.Us
Part of the Prisons & Public Health news blog
The Sacramento Bee has posted some new online maps in advance of the potential release of 27,000 California inmates due to budget cuts, and another 40,000 thanks to a federal court order to curb prison overcrowding. Last week’s map, “An overview of California prisons,” reveals the capacity of prisons throughout the state, as well as prisoner demographics and stats on their crimes, simply by rolling your mouse over each facility listed. According to the map, the California Medical Facility in Vacaville is the least overcrowded, at 118 percent of capacity. Meanwhile, the Deuel Vocational Institution in Tracy is the most overcrowded, operating at 233 percent above capacity. Earlier this month, the Bee also published the interactive map, “Counties with the most residents in prison,” which notes that Kings County has highest ratio of its residents in prison with 9.4 inmates per 1,000 county residents.

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Better Health Care, Better Prisons?

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By Bernice Yeung | Crowdfund this with Spot.Us
Part of the Prisons & Public Health news blog
In a recent New York Times op-ed, columnist Nicholas Kristof cites the case of Curtis Wilkerson as an example of lopsided budget priorities (“Priority Test: Health Care or Prisons?”), wherein health care is considered too expensive, yet long and costly prison terms are the norm. Wilkerson, you see, is a California inmate who became entangled in the state’s three-strikes laws; he’s now serving a life sentence for stealing a $2.50 pair of socks (strike one and two both involved abetting a robbery in 1981 when he was 19). California doles out $49,000 a year on each inmate housed in a state prison, and $216,000 a year on each young person incarcerated through the juvenile justice system, Kristof notes, while in contrast, the Bay Area’s Urban Strategies Council has found that only $8,000 is spent on each Oakland public school student. Prison spending has been growing for decades in California and across the country [PDF], along with incarceration rates, under the “tough on crime” banner. Yet as many public-policy makers are beginning to realize, being tough on crime doesn’t mean that they’re being safer or smarter about it.

Smarter on Crime

Alameda Plans Ahead for Parolee Surge

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By Bernice Yeung | Crowdfund this with Spot.Us
Part of the Prisons & Public Health news blog
With 40,000 inmates slated for release in the next two years due a federal court order targeting overcrowding in California prisons, what to do with all those convicts re-entering society is at the top of peoples’ minds. (In fact, the state has to come up with a plan of action by mid-September, although it will likely appeal the order.)
This is on top of the nearly 140,000 inmates released annually to California communities. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has also indicated that he’d consider the early release of even more inmates to help cut $1.2 billion from the state budget. For years, the state’s more savvy cities and counties have convened reentry task forces to improve public safety by helping parolees transition more smoothly. One of the most proactive efforts comes out of Alameda County — which receives about 7,000 parolees a year — and which has paid particular attention to the health and mental health needs of the formerly incarcerated.

Smarter on Crime

Prisons & Public Health: Lois Davis Connects the Dots

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By Bernice Yeung | Crowdfund this with Spot.Us
Part of the Prisons & Public Health news blog
Fresh from lockup and battling a host of health problems — including chronic illness, addiction and mental illness — a majority of California parolees wind up in a handful of cities like Los Angeles, Oakland and San Diego. But here’s the rub: Parolees often can’t get the services they need because they’re going back to low-income communities where health services are “severely strained,” according to a recent RAND Corporation study. The study also says that access to care for minority parolees also tends to be uneven. For example, African Americans living in Los Angeles and Alameda counties had less access to hospitals than Latino or white parolees, while in Kern and San Diego counties, Latino parolees had the least access. I spoke with Lois Davis, the lead researcher on the RAND study, which mapped where parolees go after they’re released, and analyzed — for the first time — California’s safety net of medical, mental health and addiction services available to parolees in their communities.