Senator George Runner
Serving the 17th District which incorporates portions of the Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Ventura and Kern counties.

As you probably know, because of the deteriorating condition of California’s prisons, its healthcare system is under the control of federal receiver J. Clark Kelso, not the state government, due to a court order that resulted from lawsuits. Mr. Kelso is demanding money from the state coffers to pay for improvements to local jails, re-entry facilities and increased bed capacity.

In response to Mr. Kelso’s demand, Sen. Mike Machado, of Stockton, sponsored Senate Bill 1665, which would have spent $7 billion towards this goal. I believe the Legislature should implement last year’s Assembly Bill 900, which would address the crowding problem by building 53,000 new beds, before passing Machado’s bill.

California needs a cohesive approach to prison reform, not a disjointed effort. That’s why during the final days of the budget negotiations last week, Republicans were poised to pass a budget trailer bill that would have funded the receiver’s bond and build the 53,000 beds required in AB 900. This way, we were properly addressing the first bond before working on the second.

Unfortunately, liberals in the Legislature decided to sneak in language that would have given prison inmates one day of credit for every day served – for simply breathing.

We all know the popular adage “there ain’t no such a thing as a free lunch.” Well, apparently free lunches do exist for far left liberals, and they only apply to convicted felons serving hard time in prisons. Under existing law, early release credits are earned through participation in work training and education programs, not given for free as an entitlement.

But it gets worse. If Proposition 5, the so-called Nonviolent Offender Rehabilitation Act, were to pass, inmates would be entitled to receive additional credits. With the Democrat breathing credits combined with Proposition 5 language, prisoners would be entitled to double credits – so that each day served would result in a three day reduction in sentence!

Senate Republicans tabled this “deal” once we found the offending language. Unfortunately, Democrats insisted that their amendment would not change current law in the hopes that no one would notice. We did, and once again, at the end of the legislative session, no concrete plan for improving our prisons is in place. This is outrageous.

I have requested that the Governor call a special session to resolve this issue once and for all.

I will keep you posted.