Reply #27: Scott Walker: (NOT) Tough on Crime! So according to an article in the MJS, ...

[L. Coyote]

Scott Walker: (NOT) Tough on Crime!
September 15, 2007
http://bloggingblue.com/2007/09/15/scott-walker-not-tough-on-crime/


So according to an article in the MJS, Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker wants to eliminate Milwaukee’s work release jail facility, known as the Community Correctional Center. The closing has been recommended due to the cost savings that would come from closing CCC and eliminating its staff, as well as through the elimination of maintenance costs for the facility, which hasn’t exactly aged well. I had an opportunity to work at CCC back in 1999 and 2000, and it was in dreadful shape then, and from what I’ve been told little’s been done to improve conditions for inmates and staff since then.

What’s interesting to me about the proposal to close CCC is the position that closing the facility is going to save the County millions of dollars, when in reality the cost savings probably won’t be that significant. Putting 350+ offenders on GPS bracelets year-round – which is what’s being proposed for individuals who are either at CCC now or would be sentenced there in the future – isn’t really going to be as big a cost-saving move as the article in the MJS would have folks believe. The cost of GPS monitoring averages roughly $15 per day per offender (a conservative average), and with 350+ offenders at CCC, that’s a cost of just over 1.9 million dollars per year. The article in the MJS says the county’s going to lease the GPS equipment for 148,000 dollars per year, but what I’m left to wonder is how well the new system will be run. I’ve seen firsthand how employees at CCC run the electronic surveillance program that currently exists, and I know from talking to offenders they consider the program to be a joke. It does little to hold offenders accountable, because offenders know that if they violate their conditions of ES, very little will probably happen to them.

I worry that this GPS system Scott Walker’s so gung-ho on is only going to give people a false sense of security, because GPS bracelets won’t stop offenders from engaging in criminal behavior, nor can they tell the individuals doing the monitoring when a crime is being committed by someone wearing a bracelet.

This is a bad idea on a lot of levels, and I think it’s a shame that Scott Walker is so hell-bent on gutting the county budget that he’d start making cuts to security.