Running Head: OVERPOPULATION IN CALIFORNIA PRISONS
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Overpopulation in California Prisons
Esmeralda Mauricio
California State University of Monterey Bay
Authors Note
This paper was written by Esmeralda Mauricio for Collaborative Health and Human Services 302
class.
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Table of Contents
Introduction
2
Cause #1
2
Cause #2
3
Cause #3
4
Effect #1
4
Effect #2
7
Effect #3
8
Solution #1
10
Solution #2
10
Solution #3
11
Conclusion
12
References
13
Appendix
15
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Introduction
California has been suffering from overpopulation in its state prisons for many years. The
state has been doing their best effort to reduce the population but it has not been enough. According
to the New York Times (2011) California’s prisons where almost at double their designed capacity.
According to Newman and Scott (2012) “California's prisons are currently designed to house
approximately 85,000 inmates… the California prison system housed nearly twice that many
(approximately 156,000 inmates)”. This lead the Supreme Court to take matter in their own hands.
The Supreme Court set up a three judge panel to decide whether California did have an
overpopulation problem or not. The Supreme Court had to decide on how much time the problem
had to be fixed, if they found California was guilty. The Supreme Court judges decided that
California did in fact have an overpopulation problem that had been increasing in the recent years.
The Supreme Court also considered this a great problem because the conditions in which the
prisoners were being held were a violation of their eighth amendment right which states that
prisoners cannot receive any cruel or unusual punishment (Bill of Rights, 1789). The Supreme
Court ordered California to reduce their inmate population by approximately 46,000 inmates in
two years. Since then the state has managed to reduce the total population amount to 117,030
inmates which is still considered being overpopulated (ca.gov, 2015). According to the New York
Times (2013) “In January, the number of inmates was down to about 120,000, and Gov. Jerry
Brown declared that “the prison emergency is over in California.” He implored the Supreme Court
to delay a federal court order to release nearly 10,000 more inmates. On Aug. 2, the court said no”.
This shows that even the Governor of the state is willing to keep prisoners under bad conditions
because he feels that the problem is over when in reality it is not. Overpopulation has been
increasing in California for decades, there have been many stipulations on how to stop it and reduce
it but nothing has worked. There are many causes for this problem such as underfunding, harsh
sentencing and education problems. If these causes are not fixed the overpopulation problem will
never fully diminish.
Causes
Cause #1: Underfunding
Underfunding is one major cause of over population in California prisons. According to
Skelton (2011) in a news conference held in Los Angeles, they denounced the state by saying that
state is not helping lower the overpopulation because they have not been providing money. In this
conference California residents said that the state not providing aid was seen as “mal practice”.
This shows that some California residents recognize that the state is not providing the proper funds
to house all the prisoners. A small percentage of Californians view this as a mal practice because
underfunding of prisons have many effects that not only affect the prisoners but also the
communities around them.
Skelton (2011) “Let's be honest: The politicians and the voters simply could not continue
their decades-long insistence on increasing criminal sentences and enlarging the prison population
without raising the money to pay for more cells and guards … It is a completely broken system
that was mindlessly expanded without understanding the consequences that we are now dealing
with," Brown told reporters. We want to protect public safety, but we do have limited resources”.
While current statistics reflect that because of the underfunding there has been an increase in prison
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population, the state is still not providing enough money to go towards California prisons.
Overpopulation has become of greater concern because they don’t have enough resources to keep
the prisons safe.
“Meantime, polls showed that prison spending was the first thing voters wanted to cut and
the last thing they were willing to pay more taxes for. A survey in May by the Public Policy
Institute of California found that 70% of likely voters favored reducing funds for prisons. Only
18% supported raising taxes to maintain the lockups” (Skelton, 2011). Californians do not want to
reduce sentencing for prisoners yet they do not want to pay for their stay in the prisons either. This
is a conflict because the longer an inmate stays in a prison the more expensive it is in the long run.
Skelton stated that Californians do not want to pay much taxes because they do not want prisoners
to live comfortably while they are incarcerated, but what they do not understand is that the money
will not go towards luxuries it will go in to trying to provide the proper care and necessities for the
inmates.
Cause #2: Tough Sentencing
Tough sentencing also plays a large role in overpopulation of California prisons. According
to Fuchs (2013), “The state actually had a reputation for an ultra-progressive penal system before
1980”. This shows us that California has been giving long sentences to prisoners thinking they are
solving one problem yet they are not being conscious that they are creating another. Fuchs (2013)
also said, “California began aggressively increasing sentencing in the late 1980s and 1990s in
response to nationwide fear about high crime rates”. California made a drastic decision to
increasing sentencing out of fear, not because it was necessary at the moment. California like other
states were trying to prevent one problem and created another. This quickly became a problem
“California enacted more than 1,000 laws that increased sentencing in a five-year span to settle
these fears … Legislators were competing with each other to see who could be tougher, any
politician seen as being soft on crime ran the risk of losing his seat” (Fuchs, 2013). This caused
people who did not commit harsh crimes to be sentenced for a longer periods of time. Therefore,
when crime rates did increased California prisons quickly became overcrowded.
One example of tough sentencing was the three strikes law. “California's Three Strikes
sentencing law was originally enacted in 1994. The essence of the Three Strikes law was to require
a defendant convicted of any new felony, having suffered one prior conviction of a serious felony
to be sentenced to state prison for twice the term otherwise provided for the crime. If the defendant
was convicted of any felony with two or more prior strikes, the law mandated a state prison term
of at least 25 years to life” (ca.gov, 2015)
In a California Law review provided by the state it said “The sentence enhancement
provisions of the statute accomplish two things. First, increases in the minimum sentence-from no
imprisonment to five years and then to ten years-assure that convicted offenders serve substantial
prison terms. Second, elimination of probation and suspended sentences as alternative punishments
makes imprisonment mandatory”. This shows that California wanted the maximum punishment
possible to try and stop many problems. One problem it talked about was drugs. The law said “The
basic penalty for a first violation of this statute is imprisonment with no minimum term and a
maximum term of twenty years. The offender is eligible for a suspended sentence or a grant of
probation as an alternative to incarceration. However, the penalties increase dramatically as the
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amount of drugs involved increases. If the offender distributes 500 grams or more of a mixture or
substance containing a detectable amount of the drug, the statute enhances the punishment to a
term of imprisonment that may not be less than five years, nor more than forty. Additionally, the
defendant is no longer eligible for probation or a suspended sentence. When the weight is five
kilograms or more, the mandatory minimum sentence becomes ten years in prison and the
maximum term is life imprisonment, with no probation eligibility”. These laws have now changed
but because they were so drastic and tough it had a major role in the rise of prison population.
Cause #3: Education
Lastly, a bad education system has had a very big role in over population in California
prisons. According to Hanson and Stipek (2014), “The link between a poor education and
incarceration is borne out in data. Dropouts are 3.5 times more likely to be arrested than high
school graduates. Nationally, 68 percent of all males in prison do not have a high school diploma.
Only 20 percent of California inmates demonstrate a basic level of literacy, and the average
offender reads at an eighth grade level”. This shows that since prisoners do not have a proper
education it causes them to end up committing a crime which places them in prison. Not having a
great education system also costs the state more. According to Graves (2014), “California is
expected to spend more than $62,000 on each prison inmate in 2014-15--almost 7 times the $9,200
it will spend for each K-12 student, California spending per prisoner has increased nearly three
times faster than spending per K-12 student”. This is causing for California to have to spend more
on prisoners than schools, if they had a better system they would not need to spend as much on
prisons and they will have a smaller number of inmates. Lastly, Hanson and Stipek (2014) said,
“California spends more on prisons because it fails to provide the quality of education youth need
to succeed in school. We have the tools to sever the school to prison pipeline. We need to use
them. Educate, don't incarcerate”.
Effects
Effect #1
Underfunding for prisons only creates more financial problems. Over the past years
according to Governor Browns Proclamation (2010) “the current severe overcrowding in these 29
prisons has also overwhelmed the electrical systems and/or wastewater/sewer systems, because
those systems are now often required to operate at or above the maximum intended capacity”. This
has caused the sewage system to overflow because it is being used by more people that it is
intended to. It not only causes health concerns for the inmates as well as the staff but it also causes
damages to the prions that are costly. The money that the prisons could be spending on other more
necessary things for the inmates, they are now forced to use to fix the prisons maintenance
problems. The same goes for when the electrical system goes down, this one causes problems not
only financially but also for the staff. When the lights go out in the whole prison they cannot see
everything the inmates are doing therefore the inmates safety is compromised, also the staffs safety
is put more at risk. Like Brown (2010) said, “Overloading the prison electrical systems has resulted
in power failures and blackouts within the prisons, creating increased security threats. It has also
damaged fuses and transformers”.
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Governor Brown (2012) also stated that “overloading the prison sewage and water systems
has resulted in increased, substantial risk of damage to state and privately owned property and has
resulted in multiple fines, penalties and/or notices of violations to the California Department of
Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) related to wastewater/sewer system overloading such as
groundwater contamination and environmental pollution” this means that they are now being fined
because they don’t have proper maintenance treatment to be housing all the inmates they have.
According to Brown (2010) “Overloading the prison sewage and wastewater systems has resulted
in the discharge of waste beyond treatment capacity, resulting in thousands of gallons of sewage
spills and environmental contamination… And when the prisons “over discharge” waste, bacteria
can contaminate the drinking water supply, putting the public’s health at an increased, substantial
risk”. Once again the prison is forced to spend money that they do not have which in the end only
causes more problems that they are not equipped to handle. This issue is not only affecting the
inmate population, but it is also affecting the communities and populations outside of where the
prisons are located. These communities do not have to suffer because of the negligence of the
prisons, most of these people are taxpayers which means that they are the ones paying to keep the
prisons afloat and well equipped to keep them safe from criminals but, when incidents like sewage
getting into their drinking water happen they are not getting what they are obligated to pay for.
According to Xinhua (2006) “Severe crowding in California prisons has overwhelmed
water, sewer and electrical systems and fueled hundreds of prison riots, melees and smaller
disturbances last year”. This is one of the major effects of overcrowded prisons. Prisons riots are
seem to be the only way inmates can get the attention from the public and officials, they are trying
to tell them that they are not satisfied with the way they are being treated and with how things are
running in these prisons.
Because of the underfunding some of the prisoners are having to sleep in a three bed bunk
beds in a large room that was originally intended for other things. In other words Krisberg (2015)
says, “You’re talking about hundreds of men moved into triple bunks in what used to be gyms and
cafeterias. They're not even cells. They're just empty places where we're shoving people”. These
conditions are not adequate for anyone, inmates are being treated less than a human because they
have committed a crime which is illegal in the United States. Inmates are still human and they
should be treated as such.
Underfunding of California prisons creates many health problems to not only the prisoners
but to the staff working with the inmates. Having so many people confined in such a small space
makes them more prone to infectious diseases, mental health problems and safety concerns.
According to Newman and Scott (2012) Physical security, medical treatment, and physical
conditions represent three of the five most common complaints raised in inmates … Prison
overcrowding can potentially be linked with all three of them”. An anonymous author (2010) said
“federal court took a snapshot of California's prisons, one inmate was dying each week because
the state failed to provide adequate health care. Adequate does not mean state-of-the-art, or even
tolerable. It means care meeting "the minimal civilized measure of life's necessities," in the
Supreme Court's words, so inmates do not die from rampant staph infections or commit suicide at
nearly twice the national average”.
Health problems is one of most inmates concerns, there are many diseases that inmates are
exposed to being held in the conditions that they are. One big disease that a lot of inmates are
afraid they might get is the Valley Fever. According to webmd.com (2015) “Valley fever is a
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disease caused by a fungus that gets into your body through your lungs. It can make you feel like
you have a cold or the flu and may cause a rash. Most people get better without treatment. But if
your body's natural defense system (immune system) is weak, valley fever can be
deadly…Filipinos, African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Native Americans also have a
higher risk of dying from valley fever”. The fact that these races are at a higher risk creates a higher
level of concern because a high percentage of the prisons population consist of these races.
According to Fang (2013) “A federal court order mandated that the state move prisoners
considered at higher risk of developing the disease—blacks, Filipinos, and prisoners with diabetes
or HIV—but to replace them, the state is moving in inmates from other prisons, some of whom
could also be at high risk”. The federal court ordered this because in recent studies they found that
valley fever disease rates have increased greatly in two prisons, “Pleasant Valley and Avenal State
Prison … they are as much as 1,000 times higher at Pleasant Valley” (2013). This means that they
are moving certain races and people with disease out of the most at risk prisons and moving them
to other prisons that are not as prone to the disease, but when they do this they still need to fill in
the gap of the transferred inmates with other inmates that are not at such a high risk. This is
concerning that not as high risk inmates because they might not fit the criteria of “high risk” but
they can also get the disease and die from it like any other person. “According to the California
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, the state has moved about 815 inmates out of
Avenal and Pleasant Valley and replaced them with about 300 prisoners, as of mid-August. In
2011, the two prisons were responsible for 535 of the 640 reported cases of valley fever in all
California prisons” (2013).
Fang states (2013) “Valley fever is caused by inhaling a type of fungi. Since 2006, 29
California inmates have died after contracting valley fever. Moreover, prison authorities traced the
disease as a secondary factor in 11 deaths and a tertiary factor in five deaths. The Center for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC) calls valley fever the ‘silent epidemic’ ”. This disease is also costing
the prison millions of dollars because they are trying to control it and contain it. They have to pay
for the inmate’s medical bills and transportation bills if they need to be relocated. Fang (2013)
discovered that “It has been a perpetual problem plaguing the California prison system, costing it
$23 million in health care costs as well as millions in lawsuits brought upon by former prisoners
who believe they developed the disease while imprisoned”. Overall Fang said “The relocating of
prisoners to these valley fever-infested prisons only complicates California’s notorious reputation
of prison overcrowding. The Supreme Court ruled that the state’s high prison population amounts
to cruel and unusual punishment and mandated that the state must release 10,000 inmates.
However, earlier this year, Gov. Jerry Brown (2013) claimed that “the prison emergency is over,”
refusing to heed the Court’s demands”.
Underfunding of prisons has shown an increase number of mental disorders within the
inmates. One of the reasons for this is that since there is more inmates than there are officers there
is a greater increase of violence. Some inmates fear that they will be a victim of a crime in prison,
this causes them to overuse their fight or flight. Being in constant fear caused mental problems
that the prison cannot treat because of how many inmates are needing the treatment. According to
Appelbaum (2011), “It is not difficult to imagine that such overcrowding would put extreme
pressure on mental health services, and that indeed was the case… In 1990, inmates in the state's
prisons filed suit in federal court alleging that the state was deliberately indifferent to their mental
health care needs—the standard that must be met for a constitutional violation to be found”.
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Inmates are still filling suites because they do not feel that the prison is meeting their needs. Jeanne
Woodford a former warden (2009) in San Quentin said, “I was shocked. How in modern-day
corrections can anybody think this is OK? It's really not." "If we're to address the medical and
psychological problems in our prisons, we have to get rid of overcrowding”.
A mental health disorder can be caused by many things when you are incarcerated, the fact
that California prisons are so overcrowded to the point that they some cannot have a game room
where inmates can distract themselves just adds to the inmates burden. A game room is need so
that inmates can interact with one another and get to know each other, this helps because when
inmates get along there is a lower chance of violence between them. Howard (2009) states that in
Ontario Ca state prison a “day room once envisioned as a place for inmates to play cards or watch
TV is stacked with bunk beds, 54 beds for 54 prisoners who have little room to stand. In one corner,
there is a shower and a toilet. Large fans stir the fetid air”. He also said “The state prison here is
far from the only overcrowded, dangerous and crumbling prison in California”. According to
Howard (2009) “Many prison officials and law-abiding citizens have little sympathy for the more
than 150,000 inmates crammed into the state's prisons, saying they already get some of the best
treatment in the nation”. It is sad to see how people do not care how inmates are treated, yes they
did commit crimes and how most people say it “ they are getting what they deserve” but having
inmates in the conditions they are living in is against simple human rights.
Howard asked some inmates what they thought the problem was and they all said
“overcrowding”, they know that in order for conditions to get better something needs to be done
so that the population will decrease. Howard also described that in Chinos prison the toilets were
so close to where an inmate placed his head to go to sleep that increased the possibility of getting
an infection or becoming ill. Lastly, he also describe how a cell that is usually meant for one inmate
was being used by two inmates who are both big bodied which only shows how restricted their
living conditions are.
Overall California prisons are not equipped to properly manage the inmates health needs
whether it is a health problem or a necessity. Prisons are limited on what it can spend its money
in, when prisons are not over crowded it divides the money on facilities or programs that are used
more by the inmates. When prisons are being impacted like how it is now it cannot afford to divide
the money properly, the money goes into trying to accommodate more inmates buying more
mattresses and more food. They do accommodate some of the inmate’s essential needs but if an
inmate is diagnosed with a costly illness such as cancer or a mental illness the prison does not have
enough funding to provide the correct services. Even if the prisons have the best intentions for the
inmates it cannot help, because it does not have enough funding. If the prisons were not as
overpopulated as they are they wouldn’t have such a great problem of not meeting the inmate’s
needs.
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Effect #2
One major effect caused by tough sentencing is overcrowding in prisons and county jails.
Currently prisons are at 141.5 percent above their normal capacity, as mentioned on effect number1
this has caused many problems. Each prison has different capacity and currently they are all past
the norm. Since stricter laws were enforced in the 1990’s each year prison population has been
increasing by the thousands. The graph below shows the number of inmates that have been
incarcerated since 1991. It also shows how many inmates were paroled and yet the population kept
increasing.
Since prisons were being over populated, California decided to create a new law that would
help with the problem. This law is called Realignment. According to ca.gov (2013) the realignment
is describe as the following, “In 2011, Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. signed Assembly Bill (AB)
109 and AB 117, historic legislation that has helped California to close the revolving door of lowlevel inmates cycling in and out of state prisons. It is the cornerstone of California’s solution for
reducing the number of inmates in the state’s 33 prisons to 137.5 percent of design capacity by
June 27, 2013, as ordered by the Three-Judge Court and affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court. All
provisions of AB 109 and AB 117 are prospective and implementation of the 2011 Realignment
Legislation began October 1, 2011”. This does not mean that inmates being held in prisons were
going to be transferred to county jails. Realignment was supposed to help reduce the prison
population by housing new offenders that commit crimes that would usually place in prison.
Unfortunately, harsh sentencing has created more problems than the ones the state was trying to
prevent, now not only state prisons are paying the price but county jails are too.
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Effect #3
An effect of education and the role it has played on inmate population risen is the “pipe
line from school to prison”. This is the idea that many young student are kicked out of school for
situations that would normally be given a suspension or a detention. One example of this is “The
majority of teens in the juvenile justice system engaged in non-violent crimes such as truancy or
disruptive behavior” (Hanson and Stipek, 2014). Once the student has been suspended there are
no to not many choices of where they can continue their studies. It is believed that even is the
student was a good person not having stability that education provides he or she will end up in bad
steps leading to being incarcerated. According to Hanson and Stipek (2014), “Many so-called
dropouts who end up in jail are actually push-outs. Under the guise of zero tolerance, students are
often asked to leave school as a first response rather than a last resort. Discriminatory practices are
common”. This gives a better explanation on what has been happening in the education system.
Hawkins (2010) stated that “This tradeoff between education and incarceration is
particularly acute at the community level. In many urban neighborhoods where millions of dollars
are spent to lock up residents, the education infrastructure is crippled. As the prison population
skyrocketed in the past three decades, researchers began to notice that high concentrations of
inmates were coming from a few select neighborhoods -- primarily poor communities of color -in major cities”. This explains why there is a high percentage of inmates who do not have a high
school diploma or cannot read at the level they should be able too. Hawkins (2010) also said that
“California has the largest prison population in the country, with more than 170,000 individuals
behind bars. In Los Angeles, more than half of current parolees live in neighborhoods that are
home to less than 20 percent of the city's adult residents. More than a billion dollars are spent every
year to incarcerate people from these communities.
Proposed solutions
Solution #1
One solution for underfunding is to try to convince California residents to pay more taxes
that will specifically go towards the funding of prisons. Once the state receives more money it can
make the investment into building other prisons to relieve overcrowding. A great example of this
was when the state provided 33.6 million dollars to go towards the funding of a new state prison
that was going to focus specifically on mentally ill inmates. According to Lagos (2011), “At a
dusty construction site in Vacaville adjacent to a prison yard, workers are putting the finishing
touches on a 45,000-square-foot structure that will soon house dozens of California's most severely
mentally ill offenders … The building, which will include 64 cells, is one of 13 prison construction
projects being funded by a $7.4 billion bond approved by the Legislature in 2007. It is all part of
an effort by the state to comply with a court order to reduce overcrowding and improve health care
in its prisons”. This is showing initiative from the state but the only problem with this is that this
facility will only house mental health inmates, which is great because it will help with the effects
of increased number of mental illness that underfunding has caused, but there are more inmates
who do not have a mental illnesses that will still be housed in an over capacitated prison.
A solution for the effects that underfunding has caused is to send some prisoners to private
owned prisons to reduce the overcrowding in the state prisons. California has only done this with
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one women’s facility. According to Victoria Law (2014), “To address overcrowding and
inadequate medical care, California is once again turning to private prisons. This time, however,
the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is planning to send women to a
privately run prison. In April, California contracted with GEO Group to open a 260-bed women's
prison in Bakersfield. The prison is scheduled to open in fall 2014, with the contract effective
through June 30, 2018. The contract includes an opportunity for GEO Group to expand its prison
by another 260 beds, which would increase the overall four-year revenue for the prison from
$38,132,640 to $66,394,276. Unlike contracts for other privately-run prisons, this agreement does
not include a lock-up quota. Instead, CDCR will pay for actual occupancy - $94.50 per person per
day for each of the first 260 women sent to GEO Group's McFarland Female Community Reentry
facility. If the prison takes in more than 260 women, CDCR will pay $86.95 per day for each
woman, i.e. the contract does provide CDRC with incentive to turn more women over to the
prison”. Even this has not improved the situation, the state needs to make a more drastic decision
like finding the funds to build at least two or more prisons.
If the state was too build at least two more male prisons and one female prison the
overpopulation would decrease significantly. These prisons would hold the newer inmates and the
inmates who are now being held in county jails. Over all if the state did decide to add prisons it
would see a change in numbers and also a decrease on inmate lawsuits.
Solution #2
A solution for tough sentencing would be to have laws that are not too harsh when they are
sentencing a person who has committed a crime. If the state had figured this out back in the 90’s
it would not be facing the overpopulation in prisons that they are now experiencing. Having less
strict laws will prevent inmates who did not commit a too serious of a crime to spend years in
prison using up a bed that someone else who is stuck in county jail should be occupying because
that person did commit a serious offense. The state has lowered some strict laws, in 2012 prop 36
was presented to the public. According to Ballotpedia (2012) “Proposition 36 modifies elements
of California's "Three Strikes" Law, which was approved by the state's voters in 1994. In 2004,
voters rejected Proposition 66, which like the 2012 measure was an attempt to change some aspects
of the original "Three Strikes" Law.
Proposition 36:
Revises the three strikes law to impose life sentence only when the new felony conviction is
"serious or violent." Authorizes re-sentencing for offenders currently serving life sentences if their
third strike conviction was not serious or violent and if the judge determines that the re-sentence
does not pose unreasonable risk to public safety. Continues to impose a life sentence penalty if the
third strike conviction was for "certain non-serious, non-violent sex or drug offenses or involved
firearm possession." Maintains the life sentence penalty for felons with "non-serious, non-violent
third strike if prior convictions were for rape, murder, or child molestation”. The ballot was passed
in 2012 and a result from it was a decrease of 3,000 inmates all over the state.
Solution #3
A solution to bad education leading to imprisonment is to have a better education system.
Having better programs that support teens and having fair punishment in schools are a good start
to this problem. If the education system in California was not so bad there would be more high
school graduates. Studies have shown that when someone does not graduate high school they are
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more prone to end up committing a crime and ultimately being incarcerated. According to Children
Defense Fund (2015), “There were over 700,000 suspensions given to children attending public
schools in California in the 2010-2011 school year. Across the state children are removed from
their regular classrooms for disciplinary reasons, resulting in hours, days, or weeks of lost
instructional time. While it may be necessary to administer suspensions and expulsions in some
cases, many of these suspensions result from applying zero-tolerance, punitive, or “one size fits
all” school discipline policies to low-level, trivial student misbehavior”. California needs to fix
these problems by realizing that immediately suspending or kick a child or a teen out of school has
consequences on the long run.
Another way that the education system can prevent over population in prisons is by having
more after school programs where children can spend the afternoon doing homework and staying
out of the streets. If children stay safe somewhere and out of the streets they will not be prone to
falling in to the wrong crowd. Once a child or a teen is introduced to a wrong crowed it is difficult
for them to go back into the right path. Kataoka (2013) researched how children where responding
to afterschool programs and most of her reports were positive. This supports my point that after
school programs will prevent children to get into trouble at a young age.
Having a better education system will benefit everyone, prisons will stay at lower inmate
intake and there will be more educated individuals for the future.
Conclusion
Over all overpopulation in California prisons is still a big issue that the state is trying to
fix. Overpopulation was caused and continues to be affected by underfunding, strict laws and a
bad education system. Because of these causes there has also been effects such as health and
building concerns, overcrowding, and the school to prison pipe line. The state has decreased the
inmate population in some years but prisons are still being used above their normal capacity.
Prisons being used at such high capacity have created many problems for the state. There are many
solutions that the state can try to use in to reduce the population, it just needs to want too. This
problem was not created in a year or two it has been growing since the past decade. This is a
problem that will take a long period of time to correct, but with the right ideas like the ones
mentioned above it might be a faster process.
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References
Angeles, A. (2009, August 14). California's Prison Crisis: Be Very Afraid. Retrieved March 5,
2015, from http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1916427,00.html
Anonymous, . (2010). California's prisons. Deseret News, A.16.
California’s Continuing Prison Crisis. (2013, August 10). Retrieved April 1, 2015, from
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/11/opinion/sunday/californias-continuing-prison
crisis.html?_r=1
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Appendix