Tough times to be tough on crime: an edited transcript of a recent discussion on corrections and sentencing policy among key state legislators.

• Author: Lyons, Donna

Zero tolerance for drug offenses, mandatory-minimum sentences for many crimes and "truth" laws that require serious offenders to serve 85 percent of their sentences have been the prevailing state policies of the past two decades.

Throughout the 1990s, states could mostly afford them. More recently, the worst state budget scenarios in a generation have lawmakers scrambling to cut spending, with seemingly everything on the table. At the same time, crime rates, especially those for violent crimes, have dropped substantially, while state general funds continue to pay a hefty tab for tough-on-crime laws.

A growing number of states over the past couple of years have put in place policies to divert, treat or consider nonprison options for certain offenders, usually those who use drugs or have committed other nonviolent offenses. Does this suggest a trend toward new, less costly approaches in criminal justice?

The Vera Institute of Justice, a New York City-based nonprofit that works with government on justice issues, and the National Conference of State Legislatures put this question before a group of lawmakers who are leaders in criminal justice policies in their states and nationally. Their discussion focused on how states' budget crises and declining crime rates are influencing them, their colleagues and constituents on corrections and sentencing policy. They highlighted specific strategies being enacted or pursued in their states.

CUTTING CORRECTIONS SPENDING

Moderator: How has the current budget situation in your state affected corrections?

Senator Denton Darrington (Idaho): Corrections personnel are down about 8 percent in the last year and a half with administrative, program and correctional officer positions remaining unfilled. We're as thin as you can get and still maintain order within the prisons.

Representative Michael Lawlor (Connecticut): Perhaps like most states, we're spending more money to run our prisons and jails than to run our colleges. Our prison population has been increasing steadily over the past five years. Whether or not you think everybody in jail deserves to be there, you start weighing that against the other things that make you popular, like improving roads and schools. That is the bind we are in at the moment.

Senator Don Redfern (Iowa): The corrections and judicial budgets have faced cuts. Corrections officers were among state employees furloughed last year, but in recent weeks we have reinstated many of those critical employees.

Representative Ray Allen (Texas): Out of the $5 billion corrections budget, we need to cut $172 million the last half of this year. And we need to follow that with another $525 million out of the next biennium. That will allow us to fund little more than gray boxes with steel bars. We have 151,000 people locked up in state prisons. With cuts of this size, many programs will disappear or get cut significantly.

Oregon Representative Floyd Prozanski (Oregon): Corrections has been pretty well-insulated, except for start-up costs for new prisons. But on July 1, we'll start the next biennial budget with a deficit of around $2.9 billion.

FUTURE SENTENCING OPTIONS

Moderator: How do you see this budget situation influencing corrections and sentencing discussions? What sorts of changes have been made or what proposals are before you?

Representative Bill McConico (Michigan): After last year's election, more than 85 percent of the Senate is completely new. That and the budget deficit has prompted us to look at new ideas. I'm not sure specifically how we are going to do it, but I think we'll have a different system a decade from now.

Representative Jari Askins (Oklahoma): Newer members are not as caught up in some of the crime rhetoric as many long-serving members, on both sides of the aisle, have been. There are more of us, some in leadership positions, recognizing that we can't fund education the way we say we want to unless we make changes in our sentencing policies. We realize we need to put money at the front end, that is shift dollars to treatment programs for people before they come to prison so that we can reduce those numbers.

Representative Ray Allen (Texas): We continue to have drug courts, re-entry courts, in-prison therapeutic communities and the like. What we've not done in the adult system is pull that together into a system that starts with the first criminal contact and makes certain there is an absolute consequence. On a second or subsequent...