Senate Takes Teeth Out Of House’s Prison Reform Bill
When the state House passed a prison reform bill two weeks ago, it read like the Ten Commandments.
By the time the Senate got through with it, it looked more like the 10 suggestions.
HB2010, sponsored by Rep. Ida Ballasiotes, R-Mercer Island, was aimed at reducing prison costs. It included a strict list of orders for the state’s prison system: cut staff, make prisoners work or take classes, limit their privileges.
But the Senate went for a more cautious version last week that would allow the Department of Corrections far more leeway in carrying out the wishes of the Legislature.
The differences between the two will be negotiated at conference committee meetings this week.
The House bill required a 20 percent cut in management and recreational staff at the Department of Corrections.
The Senate removed that cut, leaving only the requirement that a legislative committee study agency staffing levels and whether inmates can perform some jobs themselves.
House Republicans have repeatedly criticized the state prison system, which they say is overstaffed and wasteful.
“These are bureaucrats, and they are very well-paid bureaucrats,” said Rep. Mark Schoesler, R-Ritzville. He said the cuts were aimed at unneeded supervisors, not prison guards.
Corrections Secretary Chase Riveland said the cuts would remove guard supervisors who are needed to maintain order in prisons. Reduced staff could mean more opportunities for inmates to misbehave, he said.
Although some cuts in prison staff could be necessary, the state should be careful, said Sen. Jim Hargrove, D-Hoquiam, chairman of the Senate Human Services and Corrections Committee.
“You can’t do it to the extent that you hamstring their security interests,” Hargrove said.
The Senate also removed the requirement that all inmates either work or participate in educational programs. Instead, it would set a goal of full participation in such programs, within budget limitations.
The Senate even saved the money for art in prisons that the House version eliminated. The Senate merely requires that all such art be bought from Washington artists.
And the Senate killed the requirement that the prison system develop a plan to use inmate work crews on all future prison construction projects.
The changes pleased Riveland, who said the Senate was more “thoughtful” on the issue than the House had been.
“When people are going to make radical changes, I think it’s wise to have some knowledge behind it,” Riveland said.
Nonsense, said Ballasiotes. “I think the bottom line is nobody wants to change.”
She said the prison system has stubbornly refused to change, despite a public outcry over inmate luxuries. “We cannot even require an inmate to work and I think that’s absurd.”
Riveland said lawmakers concerned about prison costs should look at the real reason: laws passed over the past decade that have packed state prisons.
“It’s politically too tough an issue to take on,” Riveland said. “It’s much easier to put out this rhetoric.” xxxx Lowry kills phone measure Gov. Mike Lowry late Monday vetoed a measure that would have preserved U S West’s near-monopoly on Washington’s in-state long-distance telephone market, saying the bill was bad for consumers. The measure, SB5156, passed the Legislature over fierce lobbying from AT&T and MCI, which argued that telephone consumers would lose if national carriers are not allowed the same access to the in-state market as U S West.