Public Safety

Arizona’s prison population rose 52% over a 10-year period, as spending on

corrections doubled. In Arizona, spending on corrections increased by 100 percent between fiscal years 1997 and 2007, from $409 million to $817 million.  By FY 2005, corrections spending from the General fund accounted for fully 10% of our State budget - one of the highest proportions nationwide. As of April 2009, the Arizona Department of Corrections manages over 41,191 inmates and over 7,216 parolees.

A handful of nonviolent offenses is fueling nearly half the growth in Arizona’s prison population. These include driving under the influence (DUI), forgery, fraud and theft. Under Arizona’s current mandatory sentencing system, inmates convicted of nonviolent offenses make up the majority of Arizona’s prison population, including:

• 1 in 4 for property offenses

• 1 in 5 for drug offenses

• 1 in 12 for DUI, with average 3-year prison terms

(Statistical information above from the Justice Center, Recent and Projected Growth of the Arizona Prison Population at www.justicecenter.org; and Justice Strategies article, Arizona Prison Crisis: A Call for Smarts on Crime Solutions at www.justicestrategies.org)

Considering the annual cost of incarcerating these individuals, perhaps it’s time we take a hard look at the cost to Arizona taxpayers, who are often also burdened with providing government assistance to such prisoners’ families - for health care, food stamps, welfare and other social services.

How do we remain tough on crime in rough economic times?

We face some difficult choices now. While Karen believes strongly in Arizona’s “tough on crime” laws, given the extraordinary rise in costs of our prison system and the State’s deepening budget crisis, it’s clearly time we revisit how our Department of Corrections functions and find more efficient ways to run our prisons.