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Gov. Brown preparing to raid the budget for prison expansion
From the California Partnership:
We have been hearing rumors coming out of Sacramento that in the last 4 weeks of the legislative session Governor Brown is planning to dip into the state budget surplus to spend $300-400 million on prison expansion plans to meet the court ordered prison population reduction. This is $300-400 million dollars that would not be available for further restorations to education, health and human services, higher ed, or other programs, and not just this year, but for every year to come.
We’ve been doing a few rounds to allies in the Capitol to get more information and try to get ahead of the Governor's plan, and have learned that there is likely going to be a Legislative Hearing on August 27th to address the Governor's plan. We are going to make an offensive plan, hopefully reach out to other budget allies and try and get some loud opposition to Brown seeking expensive prison expansion instead of other common sense solutions.
We’ve been doing a few rounds to allies in the Capitol to get more information and try to get ahead of the Governor's plan, and have learned that there is likely going to be a Legislative Hearing on August 27th to address the Governor's plan. We are going to make an offensive plan, hopefully reach out to other budget allies and try and get some loud opposition to Brown seeking expensive prison expansion instead of other common sense solutions.
Could this be why he was so adamant about the "rainy-day" reserve fund? And about lowballing the amount of the surplus so he wouldn't have to restore any social service funding?
The bill, SB 105, is to be heard in the Assembly budget committee tomorrow (Thursday).
edit: Brown's proposal also calls for a private CCA prison in California City to be staffed with state employees!
http://www.scribd.com/doc/163603131/Prison-Plan
2 replies
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= new reply since forum marked as read
but it still funnels hundreds of millions into the prison system and does not provide for early release.
http://sd06.senate.ca.gov/news/2013-08-28-senate-democrat-proposal-prison-overcrowding-crisis
So far CA has been one of the last bulwarks against the prison-industrial complex. Yet our (D) governor is pushing this. 
The plan to involve local (mostly county) jails, called "realignment", precedes this; it was one of Gov. Brown's first initiatives. Yet he is going against it by pushing for expansion as well as blocking the closure of of the rehabilitation facility at Norco (Riverside County).