6,700 Inmates
The state of Oklahoma currently has 6,700 inmates warehoused in private prisons, halfway houses and some county jails. Unless the Oklahoma Legislature provides supplemental funding far greater than the token supplemental appropriation of $9.7 million which it doled out in its ill-fated budget, those 6,700 inmates are going to have to be placed elsewhere as the Department of Corrections can not pay for inmate warehousing with money it does not have.
With the current fiscal year not ending until June 30th and the Department of Corrections still short on funding by about $30 million to pay the private prisons, halfway houses and county jails it seems like there’s only one logical thing to do with all those inmates.
Send them home with the Oklahoma Legislators.
After all it is our lawmakers who each session insist on criminalizing more conduct while at the same time increasing sentences for existing crimes and refusing to property fund the Department of Corrections to accommodate either increased need.
The House has 101 members, the Senate 48, for a total of 149 Legislators. Since these tight fisted lawmakers do not wish to adequately fund the Department of Corrections they should contribute in other ways and taking inmates home with them would seem fitting since it is the fault of our Legislators that Oklahoma lacks sufficient ‘bed space’ for its many convicts.
With 149 Legislators, that would mean each one would only have to take about 45 inmates home with them; to feed, clothe, shelter, provide medical care and of course supervision, as after all these are convicts and we can not have them wondering about committing more crimes.
Then, maybe, just maybe, the Oklahoma Legislature would understand that warehousing convicted criminals is not the simple, easy and cheap type of operation they seem to think that it is…
