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September 15, 2008
MA: Higher education shouldn't take a back seat to prisons
Higher education shouldn't take a back seat to prisons
By Daily Hampshire Gazette
Created 09/15/2008
Sen. Stan Rosenberg is right in being outraged by how the state Legislature is not prioritizing funding for public higher education (Guest Column, Sept. 10). While he compares the University of Connecticut and University of Massachusetts systems, I offer another comparison: the University of Massachusetts system and the bloated, overpriced, ineffective Massachusetts Department of Correction.
In 2004, the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation first document that our legislators had voted in favor of spending more on prisons and jails than on its 29 colleges and universities. That year, the percentage of the DOC budget devoted to labor costs was 73 percent, the second highest in the nation.
Salaries of Massachusetts corrections officers in 2003, excluding benefits and overtime, was $59,919-$71,946 with an average of 52 paid days off. Less than 3 percent of the total budget went to all rehabilitative and educational programs. Of course, these numbers have grown since then. Gov. Deval Patrick's 2009 budget seeks $1.4 billion for the Department of Correction, surpassing the education/prison and jail spending parity that existed just a year ago.
In Massachusetts, there are over 23,000 prisoners serving time in county jails and state prisons at a cost of $48,000 per person per year. Massachusetts can follow the lead of other states by choosing much less costly and effective community-based treatment, bail reform and an end to punitive mandatory minimum sentences for drug convictions Choices can be made by taxpayers and our legislators in favor of education over incarceration.
Lois Ahrens
Northampton
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Source URL: http://www.gazettenet.com/2008/09/15/higher-education-shouldn039t-take-back-seat-prisons
Posted by lois at September 15, 2008 04:02 PM