NEWS

January 16, 2008
Does Iowa really need prison building boom?

The Iowa Legislature is being asked to invest $240 million in new and bigger prisons. Is it also prepared to make sure those prisons meet the state's needs in the long term?

This investment would represent one of Iowa's largest single capital investments in prisons, but at best it might give the state only temporary breathing room on critical prison overcrowding.

The biggest single piece of the proposed prison construction plan is $121 million to replace the Iowa State Penitentiary at Fort Madison. The rest would go toward expanded or upgraded prison and community corrections facilities in other parts of the state. While this will add capacity, it is no guarantee that the state won't be building more prisons soon to meet growing demand. The state's corrections planning agency projects that after a brief respite, the growth in prison population will continue, and Iowa could add nearly 1,000 more inmates over the next decade alone.

Beyond prison crowding, Iowa faces multiple challenges with its captive population. A disturbing number of inmates has been diagnosed as mentally ill - just under a third of men and 60 percent of women, according to a 2006 state report. Medical care, already one of the largest prison expenses, is expected to grow rapidly as the prison population ages. And, tougher penalties for sex crimes have resulted in a rapidly growing population of sex offenders who find it difficult, if not impossible, to reintegrate to their home communities.

The fact is there are things the Legislature can do to change the number of people in prison, and it can be done without making the public any less safe. Done right, the state would benefit from having convicted offenders remain in their communities and ultimately become productive citizens.

Just a few small adjustments in the numbers of convicted offenders sentenced to prison, the length of their sentences and more effective parole programs could significantly reduce the prison population.

For example, drug convictions have been a major driving force in Iowa's prison-population growth. Over the past two decades, inmates serving time for drug-related offenses grew from about 2 percent of the total to 26 percent. This is partly a result of legislative initiatives cracking down on illegal drugs. In the past three years, however, the number of new inmates admitted for drug offenses dropped after the Legislature expanded drug courts that divert drug offenders from prison toward drug-free, crime-free lives.

If Iowa has learned anything from this experience it should be that there are cheaper and more effective alternatives to confining criminal offenders in highly secure prisons. Prisons are extremely expensive to operate - an average of $40,672 a year at the maximum-security Iowa State Penitentiary. Imprisonment removes offenders from their families and community support and too often leaves them no better off than before.

Iowa lawmakers have a lot of questions to answer before going on a prison building boom. Here are two: Is this necessary? And, what else will they do to avoid another building boom down the road?

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