DOC Locking Up More and More of the Budget

Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski’s 2005 budget proposal called for an across the board 5% cut, but included a whopping 34% increase for the Department of Corrections. The Governor’s budget proposes that the state spend $1.25 billion on corrections. Even with the enormous budget increase, programs that help decrease the need for more prison space, like drug & alcohol counseling, are not being maintained.

Moth-balled due to a shortage of state funds in 2002, the prison sited for the central Oregon town of Madras is back in the 2005 Governor’s budget, and it’s bigger than its 2002 version. When completed, the new facility will imprison 2,104 people - 864 in minimum security and 1,240 in medium security. It will be the third largest prison in Oregon.

The economy of Oregon has not improved much since 2002, so the state plans to issue Certificates of Participation (COP’s) to cover the costs of the Madras prison and expansions at Shutter Creek Correctional Institution and at the women’s prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Institution. Certificates of Participation must be approved by the legislature before they’re sold to investors to raise money to cover the prison construction costs. Oregon taxpayers pay back the COP’s investors with interest.

Oregon’s prison building boom is driven by mandatory minimum sentences created ten years ago from a voter-approved ballot initiative. Oregon expects to increase its prison population by 1,550 people during the next 2 year budget cycle and 38% by the year 2014, when we’ll have over 17,000 Oregonians imprisoned.

The DOC’s Community Development Program Manager, Bobbi Burton, stated in The Madras Pioneer that once the Madras prison opens Oregon will need to build even more prisons. She said, “By the time we get to open the Madras facility, we will probably be renting beds again because the numbers are expected to continue to rise.”

Source: The Statesman Journal, Governor’s 2005 Budget, The Madras Pioneer