Relief for prison overcrowding

LAST FALL the state's latest headache was prison overcrowding. When the governor asked for relief, he got it — within a week. That was amazing considering the pressure the legislature was under: not only the largest veto calendar in the 13-year history of the fall session, but unfinished business on the scale of a state subsidy for the Regional Transportation Authority. When push came to shove, the General Assembly was forced to sign Gov. James R. Thompson's prescription, in effect a time-relief capsule for prisons; politically there was too much credit — and too much blame — at stake.

On Monday morning October 31, insisting the state faced a crisis, Thompson unveiled his plan designed to produce 3,500 new prison beds at a cost of $60 million — increasing the state prison system's 15,000-bed capacity by 20 percent over the next three years. By Friday night, November 4, realizing the state couldn't risk prison riots, the General Assembly approved the plan. Still, there were many legislators who doubted that the headcounts grudgingly provided by the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) had ever added up to the crisis the governor described.

Thompson had argued for a long-range solution whether or not prison overcrowding turned out to be a short-range problem. His prescription was intended to keep the state's latest headache from coming back — for at least three years. Under Thompson's plan for prisons:

• Short-term relief calls for more double-celling and more prison-operated work camps to create about 1,300 beds by July 1984 at a cost of about $15 million in general revenue funds;

• Medium-term relief calls for erecting two new prisons in Jacksonville and Lincoln, enlarging the one under construction in Danville, and expanding two old prisons in Dwight and Vienna to create about 1,400 beds by January 1985 at a cost of about $40 million in general obligation bonds.

•  Long-term relief calls for planning another new prison, probably in Galesburg, which could create another 750 beds by January 1987; the planning will cost $2.5 million in general obligation bonds.

Another measure for long-term relief calls for a stronger probation system created by uniting 92 fragmented county systems under one cohesive state system. Lawmakers wanted to phase in the stronger probation system over four years, but they found only enough funding for a year-and-a-half: $1.9 million for fiscal 1984 and $12.6 million for fiscal 1985, all in general revenue funds. Once strengthened, the probation system is expected to divert as many as 750 convicts to probation a year — enough to fill a standard-sized prison — but the cost is expected to run as high as $60 million a year.

If Thompson's prescription for prisons lasts three years, it will have solved the overcrowding problem for the remainder of his term. Thompson, a former federal prosecutor who was first elected on a law-and-order platform, prides himself on a strong criminal justice record during his seven years in office. Ironically, it was that record — determinate sentencing, "Class X" and mandatory imprisonment for home invasion — which had indirectly caused the overcrowding. The mere risk of prison riots threatened to undo all that Thompson said he had done.

Although the General Assembly wasn't convinced the state needed to build new prisons now, lawmakers didn't hesitate to put the state in debt for years to come: They picked a way to pay for new prisons that doesn't require added taxes now — borrowing. The General Assembly decided on a 60-40 split: Of the total $57.8 million to be financed, $40.5 million will come from selling general obligation bonds, $17.3 million from spending general revenue funds.

The most controversial part of the bonding-to-build plan is the one that calls for the erection of two new "modular" prisons in Jacksonville and Lincoln, to be financed by selling $30 million in general obligation bonds. Because they are pre-fabricated — wooden skeletons with metal skins — "modular" prisons can go up in on one-third the time and two-thirds the cost of conventional prisons. But the pair of "pre-fab pens," as one reporter dubbed them, aren't expected to last as long as it will take the state to retire the bonds.

Prison funding was the latest of what seems to be an alarming shift in state fiscal policy toward selling bonds to solve problems. Last spring lawmakers authorized hundreds of millions in revenue bond sales for loans to small business. In the fall it was tens of millions in general obligation bonds for new prison beds. Under the Thompson administration, the legislature has prided itself on controlling the governor's appetite for bonding to build. Ironically, Thompson would have taken a smaller bite to bond for prisons than the General Assembly did. The split he had suggested was closer to 50-50.

But Thompson isn't running for reection this year, the General Assembly is — and the one issue all those inmbents fear is whether the 18-month increase in the state income tax should be extended. Lawmakers wanted to avoid spending more in general funds since that would have led to pressure to continue the income tax increase beyond June 30. The state's fiscal 1984 budget is balanced so tightly Thompson's Bureau of the Budget is counting on the economy to recover faster than expected to generate enough in extra revenue — above the estimates — to cover the extra spending for prisons.

4/January 1984/Illinois Issues

The prison situation came to a head last summer after Cook County State's Atty. Richard M. Daley led other prosecutors in suing Illinois Corrections Director Michael P. Lane over Thompson's longstanding policy of releasing inmates early by using more than one 90-day block of "meritorious good time" to shorten their sentences. When the Illinois Supreme Court ruled against Thompson July 12 in Springfield, solving the overcrowding problem became a balance-of-power question. The judiciary had struck down an executive policy on the grounds that it lacked legislative authorization (see Illinois Issues, November, p. 33). Thompson was in the politically embarrassing position of having to ask the General Assembly to give him the same power he'd already been using.

It was clear from the outset that the legislature didn't like the governor's policy and wouldn't authorize him to continue releasing inmates early. That was fine with House Speaker Michael J. Madigan and Senate President Philip J. Rock, since it put the onus on Thompson to solve the problem. The harder that would be for Thompson, the easier it would be for Madigan and Rock. This was such a volatile problem the public would immediately accept or reject any solution, sending a clear signal to Springfield. All the legislature had to do was wait.

In late July Thompson came up with a $30 million plan to double-cell, expand old prisons, plan a new one — and continue to release inmates early. The governor asked for a strictly defined early release power, which he insisted he would use as a "last resort" when population ran 5 percent over capacity, and then only in calendar 1984. He went on to say he wanted to continue conversion of former mental health facilities like the one underway in Dixon. He dismissed, however, Daley's suggestion that Illinois erect "modular" prisons, arguing modulars were expensive, unavailable and too easily damaged. And he made no mention of a stronger probation system, since he had just vetoed such a bill, primarily because of its $22 million price tag. He knew lawmakers already had second thoughts about spending so much. Although he toyed with the idea, Thompson never called the General Assembly into special session to approve his plan during August and September.

By the time the legislature convened for the first half of its fall session in mid-October, the Governor's Task Force on Prison Crowding, which Thompson had created back in April, was ready to report. Not surprisingly, the task force endorsed Thompson's short-term solutions, including an even more strictly defined early-release policy. But for the long term they went far beyond his plan to build more prisons, calling for consolidation of the 92-unit county probation system under a 30-unit, court-controlled state probation system, complete overhaul of state sentencing laws to reserve prisons for only the most violent offenders, and massive expansion of locally operated programs as an alternative to prison for less serious offenders. The most controversial recommendation, however, was that which called for the repeal of a 1978 state law requiring judges to send home invaders to prison for at least four years, a law proponents of repeal said was responsible for filling 800 beds alone.

At the same time the Illinois Coalition for Prison Alternatives, composed of 15 groups including the John Howard Association, a widely known prison watchdog group, released an agenda which damned Thompson for his reliance on prisons, praised the task force for spelling out the alternatives, but called on the state to go further.

As the General Assembly already knew, the public was opposed to early release in any form. Once the task force reported, it was clear the public was equally outraged by the suggestion of letting home invaders off with probation, much less the idea of overhauling state sentencing laws. The public clearly wanted prisons and the reasons were economical as well as emotional. About 20 central Illinois communities had lost the sweepstakes a year earlier when Danville was selected as the site for the state's newest prison, and most of them jumped back on the bandwagon.

Meanwhile, overcrowding seemed to be reaching crisis proportions. By mid-October, IDOC was busing the overflow to medium security prisons down-state in Centralia, Hillsboro and Vandalia, where inmates were given pallets and housed in the gym, chapel and even the halls. When Warden George Welborn invited reporters to tour the Centralia Correctional Center, inmates were quoted as saying that tension ran so high they were requesting transfers back to Pontiac and other maximum security prisons upstate. Although Thompson had ordered the emergency housing measures just as surely as he had ordered early release, somehow it was the General Assembly which was indicted when newspapers charged the state with "letting them sleep on the floor."

By the time the General Assembly reconvened for the second half of its fall session in early November, Thompson had conceded on four points: He abandoned early release, embraced modular prisons, gave up on conversion of mental health facilities as too costly and agreed to accept a stronger probation system if it was phased in.

Knowing the General Assembly was not scheduled to return to Springfield until January, Thompson made his final offer: a $60 million plan that included building two modular prisons. The waiting game had backfired; Madigan and Rock had no choice but to push Thompson's plan through the General Assembly.

Lawmakers suspected Thompson had manipulated the crisis, but they had no time to prove it. All that week they tried, but failed, to get a satisfactory explanation when they grilled IDOC personnel as to why projected headcounts showed a surplus of beds by summer 1985 but a shortage again by spring 1986. Finally, on Friday night after the Senate had approved Thompson's plan and gone home, the House erupted. Some white lawmakers, frustrated by the unsatisfactory headcounts, joined the black bloc, which was trying to kill the bills in a last, desperate attempt — via parliamentary maneuver — arguing that building more prisons would fail to solve the underlying problem of the rise in crime. From the floor, Madigan had to "implore" House Democrats to approve Thompson's plan before the bills were passed.

January 1984/Illinois Issues/5