It's a topic of discussion in the West and Midwest.
Laura Repke writes, "Would disabled receive better care in prison?" in the San Francisco Chronicle.
I'm beginning to hope my son will be sent to prison - perhaps Death Row.
Rob stands accused of no crime. And I am not an unloving mother. Let me explain: Rob has a developmental disability, and California is balancing its budget by gutting the services that keep him alive.
The situation is dire enough that I must wonder: Once Rob's services are cut, will Death Row be a safer place for him?
I know that every program is getting cut. But the single largest budget cut just signed into law by the governor - $568.6 million - is for services for people with developmental disabilities.
For Rob, and 246,000 other Californians like him, that money went to get him to medical appointments, to manage his finances and - hopefully - to have someone look out for his safety after his father and I are no longer alive.
And:
In recent years, Rob lost his dental coverage, his physical therapy and his vision care - despite his difficulty walking and seeing. Now the state sees room for another half billion dollars in cuts. That's why Death Row - with its steady funding and a decade of room and board - is looking better and better. (San Quentin State Prison even offers views of San Francisco Bay and is set to receive a new $356 million facility.)
So, how can you help? Contact the governor and protest the cuts to services for people with developmental disabilities. If that fails, then consider framing one of them for a capital offense. You'll be guaranteeing them health care and three meals a day for 10 years or more - and possibly a room with a view.
"Illinois Proves (Again) That Ending the Death Penalty Saves Money," is James Clark's most recent Change.org post.
Thanks to Illinois, we now have more proof: ending the death penalty saves money - a lot of money - and quickly.
So what is California waiting for?
It’s less than a month since Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed the death penalty repeal bill, replacing the death penalty with life without the possibility of parole and diverting the cost savings to victims’ services. Just two weeks later savings had already reached $4.7 million!
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Today's Arizona Republic carries the OpEd, "Arizona should discuss ending death penalty," written by Bob Schwartz.
The last time Arizona executed three prisoners in a six-month period was more than a decade ago - the year 2000. We are about to do it again. Jeffrey Landrigan, October 26. Eric King, March 29. Daniel Wayne Cook, April 5.
Since 2000 only seven states have conducted more than five executions in an entire year. Yet, Arizona is on a pace to exceed that mark this year, and most Arizonans know nothing about this state sanctioned killing spree.
And:
Arizona is becoming famous worldwide for the antics of our state government. The death penalty just adds to our public-relations troubles. In a time when government spending is thought to be subject to close examination, we cling to a penal code that is as costly as it is brutal. Far more tax dollars are spent to put someone to death than to imprison him or her for life.
From Indiana, the Indianapolis Business Journal carries Sheila Suess Kennedy monthly column, "Death (penalty) and taxes aren't certainties after all."
These days, those of us who follow policy debates are suffering from overload: same-sex marriage, immigration policy, foreign policy—not to mention the re-emergence of pocketbook issues like collective bargaining rights—are generating lots of heat, if distressingly little light.
And then, of course, there are the perennial complaints about taxes.
Everyone, it seems, wants government to cost less—until someone suggests cuts to our particular sacred cows. In Washington, we see lawmakers eager to de-fund Planned Parenthood and National Public Radio become livid when someone suggests cutting military spending. Here in Indiana, an eminently reasonable proposal by Gov. Mitch Daniels and the chief justice to incarcerate fewer nonviolent offenders and save the billions of tax dollars that we would otherwise spend building additional prisons has been eviscerated by defenders of “law and order.”
In fact, the criminal-justice system offers one of the best opportunities to save significant tax dollars, beginning with abolition of the death penalty.
People have different opinions about the morality of capital punishment, and I leave those arguments to ethicists and theologians. There are, however, some pretty compelling practical and fiscal arguments for abolition.
In Ohio, Jack D'Aurora writes the OpEd. "Death penalty is a budget-buster," for the Columbus Dispatch.
If Ohio and other states are truly interested in looking at all possibilities for cutting budgets, they should shut down Death Row.
Last month, Illinois abolished the death penalty, joining 15 other states and the District of Columbia. The path was laid in 2000 by then-Gov. George Ryan, who declared a moratorium on executions because of growing evidence that innocent people were being executed by the state, at least 20 by some counts.
If the possibility of killing innocent people isn't enough to prod abolishing the death penalty, then perhaps the economics are. Since the moratorium in Illinois ended, the state spent, according to the Chicago Tribune, more than $120 million to send 15 more people to sit on Death Row, while their cases continued through the court system.
In Ohio, we have 157 offenders on Death Row. If we apply the cost figures from Illinois, Ohio has spent $1.2 billion to send those offenders to Death Row. Even if a simple extrapolation of cost figures doesn't produce completely accurate numbers, the Illinois cost figures should give any taxpayer cause to ponder the cost efficiency of the system.
And:
Ohio reinstated the death penalty in 1981. What better time than this 30th anniversary to re-evaluate whether the death penalty serves the public interest? The overriding question is: Does the death penalty make sense? The expense is enormous, the death penalty delays closure and the system loses credibility when we do nothing about its faults. Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens called for "a dispassionate, impartial comparison of the enormous costs that death-penalty litigation imposes on society with the benefits it produces."
Gov. John Kasich has encouraged us to think out of the box when it comes to cost-cutting. Here's an easy opportunity.
Related posts are in the cost index.
Comments