Lawn care goes hi-tech

[The Daring Dufas]

Goofy Limeys, drive on the wrong side of the road anyway.

TDD

[JimT]

That's a pretty impressive site. Concise and to the point.

[The Daring Dufas]

Hasn't that been tried in relation to immigration law? I gave up years ago trying to get government officials to do their jobs. I reported to the FBI a crime committed by a LEO. The agents did their job, investigated and told me that yes the LEO did commit a crime. The FBI agents reported their findings to The US Attorney who's response was "We don't consider it a serious enough crime so we won't prosecute." I asked for a list of federal crimes that were not serious enough to prosecute so I could make it known to everyone but the feds declined my request. Funny thing happened some years later when a LEO political candidate did the same thing when he investigated voter fraud, it suddenly became a serious crime for which the LEO was prosecuted and imprisoned. Strange how that works.

TDD

[The Daring Dufas]

I thought so too. Dang! What a great source of information to use to educate myself with facts that I can hit ignorant fools upside the head with. *snicker*

TDD

[HeyBub]

Texas: "Prisons cost Texas taxpayers $49.40 per inmate per day, which is $18,031 per year. is is lower than the national average of $24,656."

California: "Avg Yearly Cost: per inmate, $49,000" And others. Keep looking.

Regrettably, that's true. That figure is but a strong indicator that we need MORE prisons and need to lock up MORE people. Still, there are several reasons, beyond our immediate control, for the statistics:

• Texas does not release people because the jails are overcrowded, as California must do under federal court order.

• Texas does not release people because the state can't afford to keep them locked up as was the case in Michigan this past year.

• While all states have an influx of illegal immigrants, the ones in Ohio are there to work while many in Texas come across the border merely to kill, maim, and mope. Then they go back to Mexico.

• We don't ignore as much law-breaking as some other places. Many Katrina evacuees, for example, found their ordinary daily activities, ignored in New Orleans, were felonies in Texas.

• Also, Texas contracts with other states to hold their inmates. Our state could charge, say, Minnesota, /day to hold one of their criminals. We make a profit of /day and Minnesota saves over /day (1996). It's a win-win scenario. See: Plus, we've got at least 31,000 federal prisoners in our lock-ups.

Point is, not everybody locked up in Texas prisons are there because they broke Texas law. Idaho, for example, may have a smaller percentage of their population in their prisons than Texas, but that's partly because the Idaho criminals are in Texas jails!

Here's an interesting way to save money:

"Every inmate in a California prison costs taxpayers over $47,000 a year. Because of the state's astronomical prison costs, a new Reason Foundation-Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Foundation study finds California could save $120 million a year for each 5,000 inmates it sends to private prisons in other states. "

We'll be glad to take 'em.

[HeyBub]

Right. But a government official committing a crime is not the same thing as that same individual refusing to do his mandated duty. Usually there is no penalty attached to the latter.

For example, suppose a county clerk refuses to issue a marriage license to a legally-qualified couple. The couple can get a judge to order the clerk to issue the license but cannot file criminal charges against that same public official.

That's not the case with the new Arizona law.

[JimT]

.....pretty interesting material. I'm all for it. I don't like the ratio of violent vs. non-violent inmates, but I'm more of a libertarian than a Republican. To me, locking up a marijuana dealer, is putting an entrepreneur out of business.

There are other things about TX stats that bug me but it sounds like we have some progessive ideas about costs. As far as bring them here; fine as long as they don't stay.

[krw]

>

There was a study done in the NY prisons a few years ago, looking for the percentage of people incarcerated for drug violations where there was no violent crimes committed. They found one (no, not one percent).

"Welcome to Texas, now go home"? ;-)

[JimT]

>>

I was wondering if they have to go back to the state they were convicted to serve out thier probation? I don't know much about this stuff; thankfully!

[aemeijers]

Sounds like maybe they have cleaned up their act a little. First half of

20th century or so, and probably back in the 19th as well, it was routine to rent out prisoners as field labor. Some counties were known to arrest transients on trumped-up charges and have a make-believe trial, when they were short a few bodies. The plantation mentality died real hard in some places. If you were poor and barely literate (and usually black), in those pre-Miranda day, if you got busted, well, not a whole lot you could do about it.

Don't get me wrong, I think prisoner work programs can be a Real Good Thing, if everything is done on the up-and-up, and the prisoner gets some OJT in salable skills, and maybe a better attitude. But from what I have read over the years, some of the programs in the old days were little more than thinly-disguised slavery.

-- aem sends...

[krw]

>>>

After Katrina, I would hope Texas would have thought that far ahead.

Indeed. I do find the Texas prison model interesting, though. Maracopa county, AZ is another model that should be studied nationwide, pink undies or no.

[hibb]

I agree but it did tick me off a bit when I lost a good contract with the local city to a prison labor program from a neighboring county. I had the contract for years and they made damn sure I didn't hire any ex-cons to work in the police department and then they let me go and hire convicts.

[Don Klipstein]

It appears to me that Texas, despite lower cost per inmate, has above-average % of state budget for "corrections" due to spending less elsewhere or due to having higher percentage of its population in prison.

(Not that I find too much fault with keeping career criminals behind bars as opposed to letting them out to commit more crime.)

Above-national-average % of population in prison is result of rather than a cause of above-national-average crime rate.

Maybe Texas needs to do more for crime prevention, otherwise maybe Texas has more than its national-average-share of outlaws.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[Stormin Mormon]

I'm sure scams have been happening since the earliest days. But now, high tech. That's a shame. I'm with you. They can come out and look in person before I agree to a deal.

[HeyBub]

"People get convicted not for what they did, but for what can be proved, and often what is proved is not what they did," so says Alan Dershowitz. Dershowitz went on to say "Most criminal defendants cannot be convicted without violating some fundamental right. This rule is known to the judge, the prosecutor, and the defense.*"

It makes sense to put a $100/day Heroin addict in prison for possession of narcotics (a non-violent felony) thereby preventing an armed robbery a day (a violent felony). Or three burglaries. Or one car theft.

[JimT]

While this all is interesting, the original point began with the cost of locking up more people. So f$%king what if TX can lock them up per inmate cheaper if we are still paying 1% over the national average as a % of total state buget?

The bottom line is all that matters to me. I'm not going to prison anytime soon. Good for f$%king Texas; they can lock them up cheap. Lower my f$%king taxes TOO! Too many motherf$%kers are in jail in Texas....PERIOD!

:-)

Jim

[Don Klipstein]

What if the reason Texas has above-average % of budget being spent on incarcerations because their budget has below-national-average spending on excesses, waste, and pork?

However, I might want to look into whether Texas could make a move towards drug treatment programs, methadone, or the like.

One more thing: It appears to me that USA is worst-in-the-world with drug laws. I think USA needs to move to one of two extremes:

1. Have drug laws like those that Germany had in the late 1970's according to my highschool German teacher. Get caught with half a joint, spend 2 years in "the joint".
2. Have recreational drug laws like those that USA had in 1900. Back then, marijuana, cocaine and opiates were legal.

- Don Klipstein ( [e-mail])

[norminn]

clipped

We tried that...at least when the smokers were black.

"Natural selection" might take care of the problem in the long-run. Last week, the St. Pete Times ran an article about oxycontin overdose deaths...there were more than 100 last year in Hillsborough County (Tampa) alone. I don't recall for sure, but I think some of the other area counties had more deaths than HC in the same period. The article also gave some numbers for visits to "pain clinics" that dish out prescriptions at alarming rates.

When medicaid for "everyone" kicks in, it probably will take off like free gold bars....death is the only sure "cure" for addiction.

I hope they again ban TV ads for pharmaceuticals..."This drug might cause dizzyness, nausea, vomiting, death, but it sure as hell will make you feel better".

[Oren]

_National Institute of Corrections_ has for many years (decades) been ran and managed by top officials, federal and state retirees / consultants. All with a Corrections background.

More on the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP)*

And. Remember many TX state prisoners are held (contract) by the federals.

Tax dollars at work.

Weekly Population Report

Total Federal Inmates: 211,253 (Last updated on April 22, 2010 )

The weekly population report is generated every Thursday at 12:00 a.m.

The fed population, 30 years ago was 50,000

[Oren]

Ordinarily - parole supervision is served in the court of jurisdiction. That can be changed.

For the record, if one serves time in prison he has already past the probation stage of the courts.

IOW prisoners don't get probation from prison, but get parole.

Parole was hampered when authories stopped parole.

I can hear it now!

"Boss, I gotta take it to the door!!"

It means he walks out without a supervision. Time served.