Pubdate: Wed, 06 Oct 2004
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Copyright: 2004 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.uniontrib.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/386
Note: Does not print LTEs from outside it's circulation area.
Author: Francis Courser
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/props.htm (Ballot Initiatives)

REGARDING THE SEPT. 30 EDITORIAL "NO ON PROP. 66":

Crime was falling two years before three strikes was ever enacted. Many 
states without a three-strikes law have enjoyed the same drop in crime as 
California.

California incarcerates more people under our three-strikes law than most 
other states combined.

The legislative analyst estimates that under Proposition 66, "net savings 
of potentially several tens of millions of dollars annually, increasing to 
several hundred million dollars annually, primarily to the prison system" 
due to shorter sentences for non-violent offenders. This could be much 
more, as our prison system currently operates at 200 percent capacity, and 
just to bring us to 100 percent would mean spending $25 billion on new prisons.

And why would our jails be full to overflowing when crime has dropped so 
dramatically? California has the largest and most wasteful prison system in 
the nation, still under threat of takeover by a federal judge. Our prison 
system has overspent its budget in the last five years by $1.6 billion. If 
you include second and third strikers in prison under this law, there are 
42,000 inmates. Nearly two-thirds were convicted of nonviolent crimes. That 
is over 25 percent of the entire prison population.

The Union-Tribune should applaud Proposition 66 as a means to reform a very 
broken and wasteful system.

FRANCIS COURSER

Escondido