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By Assemblyman Brian Jones
"In this realignment, which I strongly opposed, inmates convicted of certain crimes that would have sent them to state prison will instead be housed in county correctional facilities. What the Governor and those who voted for his plan failed to realize is the fact that many of the county facilities are already dangerously over-crowded, thus many of these “low-level” offenders will be receiving a “get out of jail free” card. "
October 13, 2011 (Sacramento) -- There are many reasons people enter into public service. For some, it is to gain power and influence. For others it is to make a profound difference for their community. As a lifelong resident of Santee, I put myself firmly into the second category. And since my early days on the Santee City Council, public safety has been a top priority.
I ran for the State Assembly last year in order to bring some of our community’s common sense ideas back to Sacramento. While spending the last year on the Assembly floor I have realized one thing – common sense doesn’t seem to carry the day in the State Legislature.
A prime example was this year’s battle over public safety “realignment,” which is the shifting of thousands of inmates from state prison to county jails. It is a historic and fundamental shift in our prison system proposed by Governor Jerry Brown and approved on a partisan vote earlier this year. The plan took effect on October 1.
In this realignment, which I strongly opposed, inmates convicted of certain crimes that would have sent them to state prison will instead be housed in county correctional facilities. What the Governor and those who voted for his plan failed to realize is the fact that many of the county facilities are already dangerously over-crowded, thus many of these “low-level” offenders will be receiving a “get out of jail free” card.
With no room to place these hardened convicted criminals and no proper oversight; many will be transferred to county facilities. With nowhere to house them, they will be released. This move will essentially flood our communities with inmates who have committed serious crimes and not paid their debt to society.
The San Diego County Jail can house up to 944 prisoners. As of this morning there are currently 762 people in custody at that location. This means that as soon as 182 people are transferred or sentenced to county jail for previously prison worthy crimes, the next person will put the jail at above capacity. A new report from the California Department of Corrections shows that after realignment is implemented, we could be short as many as 4,473 cells in San Diego County to house the felons who will now serve their time in local communities.
This means that to maintain a healthy and legal level of inmates, someone will be released early. This will eventually lead to our streets being less safe. By 2014, as many as 52,000 convicted criminals will be sent back to local communities rather than serving their time in state prison. While the Governor insists that these are “low-level” offenders, nothing could be further from the truth, the reality is that 500 crimes will be included in by realignment, including some very troubling crimes like child abandonment, vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated and involuntary manslaughter.
Now, I ask you, do the people who have committed those crimes seem like “low-level” offenders to you? Republicans did propose a number of bills that would have kept these dangerous criminals behind bars where they belong. Yet all of them were blocked by the Governor’s allies.
Furthermore, this realignment program only has funding for this year, after that there is no guaranteed funding, and thus, any oversight of these felons will be lost.
As East County’s representative in the State Assembly, I will continue to fight against these absurd measures. I hope you will continue to stay informed with the impact of the Governor’s realignment plan on our communities by visiting our new “California Crime Watch” website at http://arc.asm.ca.gov/CaCrimeWatch.
Assemblyman Brian Jones, R-Santee, represents the 77th Assembly District in the California Legislature.The views expressed in this editorial reflect the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of East County Magazine. To submit an editorial for consideration, contact editor@eastcountymagazine.org
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