Pubdate: Fri, 06 Sep 2002
Source: Parkersburg Sentinel, The (WV)
Copyright: 2002, The Parkersburg Sentinel
Contact:  http://www.newsandsentinel.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1647
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/prison.htm (Incarceration)

A  BETTER IDEA

Jail Alternative Program A Success Worth Copying

Three Northern Panhandle counties appear to have benefited from an 
alternative to locking some criminals up and taking out the checkbook. It 
is time for the program to be considered elsewhere in West Virginia.

State legislators holding interim meetings in Wheeling during the weekend 
heard a report from James Lee, probation officer for the community 
corrections program in Brooke, Hancock and Ohio counties. The program is 
saving those three counties about $630,000 a year in costs to incarcerate 
those guilty of relatively minor offenses, Lee explained. As much as $145 
million in costs to construct new prisons could be saved if the program is 
implemented throughout the state, Lee told lawmakers.

Jail and prison space is limited, with some facilities overcrowded. 
Clearly, the Mountain State simply cannot afford to build new jails and 
prisons now.

County governments already have encountered severe difficulty in paying to 
have prisoners housed at the state's regional jails. Until relatively 
recently, however, they had few alternatives.

The program with which Lee is involved offers a viable means of dealing 
with some offenders while avoiding the high cost to counties of sending 
them to jail - and the even higher cost to the state of building new jails.

In the Northern Panhandle, alternative sentencing allows minor offenders to 
avoid lengthy jail sentences by doing community service work, pursuing 
education or working in jobs - while reporting regularly to authorities who 
monitor both their progress and whether they are moving away from or back 
to lives of crime. In many cases, those in the alternative sentencing 
program are one-time offenders who, with careful monitoring, are no threat 
to the community.

Alternative sentencing appears to be working in the Northern Panhandle. 
Legislators who heard Lee's report should make it a priority to expand the 
program to other counties.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom