Twenty years ago this month, President Clinton signed into law the Omnibus Crime Bill, amid much self-congratulation by politicians.
Today, however, most observers on the Left and Right are critical of many parts of the bill, and have concluded that the public didn’t get as much public safety as $33 billion should have bought.
The bill offered $9.7 billion to the states for prison construction, setting off a frenzy of prison-building. This was a fool’s bargain. The feds provided one-time money for bricks and mortar, but they attached strings to the funding, requiring the states to severely increase sentences, even for those inmates who could be safely released.
This caused the number of state prisoners to soar, increasing by more than 45 percent, and the number in federal prisons more than doubled. The number of inmates in American prisons and jails grew from 1.01 million in 1994 to 2.3 million today. Roughly one out of every 100 adults in the U.S. is behind bars as you read this.
The bill’s proponents claimed that new prison cells were needed to protect us from violent criminals: “The worst of the worst.” But they pulled a bait-and-switch. Many of the new prison beds are not packed with violent predators. Instead, they are filled with nonviolent offenders.
We need prisons, but we are overusing them. Prisons are meant for people we are afraid of, but many of the inmates are there because they merely broke the rules. We are merely mad at them, not afraid of them. It makes no sense to put someone who writes bad checks in prison with murderers. Which inmate do you think will have the bigger impact on the other — the check-bouncer or the murderer?
The federal money for prison construction was one-time only, but the costs of operating the prisons continue to this day. The money for guards, supplies, utilities, food, etc. comes out of the states’ budgets, siphoning off money that could go to schools, roads and hospitals. And the Crime Bill didn’t provide a dime for programs that prepare the inmates to return to their communities. No wonder so many offenders return to prison within three years.
The states are saddled with the cost of these prisons, and it is busting their budgets. Prisons are the second fastest growing items in state budgets, second only to Medicaid.
But there is good news. Across the country, conservatives have been working to reverse the fiscal and human costs of the Crime Bill. Right on Crime, a partnership between the American Conservative Union Foundation (ACUF), the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) and Prison Fellowship Ministries (PFM), has been working with leaders in several states to cut prison costs by expanding drug courts, increasing drug treatment and mental health care and limiting the use of costly prison beds to dangerous and serious repeat offenders. These reforms have saved billions, and crime rates are down.
Texas scrapped its plans to build more prisons. They put much of the savings into drug courts and treatment. The results have been impressive: Crime in Texas is at its lowest rate since 1968. The number of inmates has fallen by 3 percent from its peak, enabling the Texas to close three prisons and save $3 billion so far.
South Carolina toughened penalties for violent criminals while creating alternatives such as community drug treatment and mental health services for lower-level lawbreakers. South Carolina’s recidivism rates are much improved, and the state has closed one prison. Savings to date: $12.5 million. The states of Ohio, Georgia, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Missouri, Pennsylvania and Mississippi have adopted similar reforms.
By intelligently reserving costly prison beds for violent and serious criminals, these states have not only cut their costs, but their crime rates have fallen too. In fact, their crime rates have dropped more than the states that have continued to expand their prisons. Pew reports that “states that decreased their imprisonment rates cut crime more than states that increased imprisonment.” Pew found that the five states with the largest drops in their incarceration rate since 1994 saw an average 45 percent drop in crime over the time period. The five states with the largest increases in incarceration rate saw a far smaller average 27 percent drop in crime over that same period.
By applying conservative principles of being tough on violent criminals and tight with taxpayer dollars, the states have shown they can save money and keep crime down. That’s getting it “Right on Crime.”
Pat Nolan is the Director of the Center for Criminal Justice Reform at the American Conservative Union Foundation, and is a leader in the Right on Crime movement. Thinking of submitting an op-ed to the Washington Examiner? Be sure to read our guidelines on submissions for editorials, available at this link.
