In 2012, I learned that Whatcom County shares the problem of overflowing prisons with the rest of the nation. In 2009, it cost Washington state $51,775 per inmate annually, according to a 2012 Center on Sentencing and Corrections report.
In comparison, it cost Washington a mean of $5,292 annually per offender through the Reentry Housing Pilot Program, according to a 2009 Washington State University report. This is almost one-tenth of the cost to incarcerate a person. It is clear that reentry programs would save the state a significant amount of taxpayer money.
One of the main problems surrounding our overcrowded prisons is our misconception about them. Many people believe that convicted felons should be locked up and permanently disenfranchised. However, locking people up and putting them together only concentrates crime. Many criminals who finish their sentences or are let out early end up back in prison because society does not offer enough opportunities for recourse.
We need to reevaluate our policies and how we deal with crime. There should be more resources being put into reentry and parole programs in order to get people out of prison.
This approach would do a lot for our communities in the way of saving taxpayer money as well as offer an alternative approach to dealing with crime. Instead, we have people who want to build more prisons to lock up more and more criminals. The United States locks up more people than any other country in the world.
There is something wrong with that. It is not that we have more criminals; it is that we do not have a good system to handle our situation. Our current so-called correctional facilities do not correct or rehabilitate, they serve to exacerbate crime and drain resources.
