Because 90% of all prisoners in the United States are in state facilities, the work that states are doing to reduce their prison populations is crucial. Attempting to end mass incarceration necessitates realizing this is a situation requiring not one national solution, but fifty state solutions. Below are current state solutions that could be effectively modeled by other states for meaningful reform.
“Today, Wisconsin’s jail and prison population still towers over Minnesota’s, 35,000 to 16,000. Its prisons require $150 per every Wisconsinite to stay running -- roughly twice what is required per each Minnesota citizen. And for all that money and heartbreak, it hasn’t made much of a dent in Wisconsin’s share of crime. The rates are similar in each state.“
City Pages
October 29, 2018
Read More“Wisconsin is positioned to address the problems of overcrowded and unsafe prisons at the same time. Assuming there is only one solution, e.g. building new prisons, to a problem is folly. Old prisons that pose significant risk to officers and inmates alike need to be addressed and closed if necessary. It would be foolish to not examine why so many prisons are needed in the first place. The legislature and the administration should closely examine if truth sentencing, as it exists today, simply results in warehousing people. As Governor Thompson suggested it’s not benefitting public safety.“
Right on Crime
September 24, 2018
Read More"Gov. Scott Walker declined to meet with his corrections secretary as a crisis unfolded at the state’s teen prison and his staff deliberately kept him from visiting the facility, according to a new book by Walker’s former prisons chief."
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
August 10, 2018
Read More"'I think anybody who's talking about that is driving away from the real issue in this race,' Walker said. 'I don't hear from voters about visiting anybody other than visiting victims of crime, who want me to focus on making sure that the violent criminals who'd be let out under the Democrat plan are not going to be let out any time soon'."
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
August 9, 2018
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