🔒Criminal-justice reforms make economic sense

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy had a front-row seat to President Barack Obama's final State of the Union address last week, a perch he earned for enacting many policies viewed favorably by the liberal commander in chief.

Whether it's increasing the minimum wage or pushing tighter gun-control laws, Malloy has been on the frontlines of many policy initiatives that have put him on the national stage as one of the country's leading progressive politicians.

While some of Malloy's agenda has stoked partisan divide, one initiative that should be supported and shepherded along carefully but diligently is his criminal-justice reforms, which aim to create a “second-chance society” by sending fewer non-violent offenders to prison and better reintegrating ex-cons into society.

These reform efforts are not just about social justice. It's also an economic issue. Connecticut taxpayers spend approximately $56,375 annually (including fringe benefits) to house, feed and care for each of the approximately 15,580 inmates in the state.

The state budget allocates hundreds of millions of dollars each year to fund the Department of Corrections, an expenditure that must be trimmed if Connecticut wants to successfully confront a fiscal crisis that two rounds of tax hikes and countless budget cuts haven't been able to fix. There's an opportunity for real savings, as the recent closure of the Niantic Annex prison at the York Correctional Institution shows.

Mothballing that facility, which took effect Jan. 9, will save taxpayers about $7.9 million per year, according to Malloy's office.

Those, of course, are only direct expenditures on the criminal-justice system. What's harder to define, but potentially more costly to the state both socially and economically, is the effect imprisonment has on our citizens.

About 63 percent of individuals who land in prison and are released are re-arrested for a new offense within three years (56 percent are eventually returned to prison). Those who do stay out of jail often run into economic hardship because employers are hesitant to embrace ex-cons, contributing to Connecticut's largest in the nation wealth gap and increased spending on social services programs.

To be clear, we aren't advocating for a loosening of criminal laws that allow murderers, rapists and other violent offenders to roam the streets freely. A delicate balance must be struck between giving people a second chance and keeping residents safe.

So far, Malloy appears to have found that sweet spot through reasonable measures that focus on providing treatment to low-level drug offenders, rather than locking them up and throwing away the key.

In December, for example, Malloy announced plans to use one of the state's existing 18 prisons to house inmates between the ages of 18 and 25, to provide them focused treatments and education that hopefully keeps them out of jail when they get older.

Other reforms reduce penalties for low-level drug possession charges and establish an expedited parole process for nonviolent, no-victim offenses.

Employers can play a role in this process by giving ex-offenders a chance at earning honest pay, however we believe businesses have the right to hire whoever they want. One way the state can make low-level ex-offenders more attractive is by offering a tax credit to employers who hire them.

Some of that is already in play. Money, for example, has been allocated for job-based adult education and employment training for ex-offenders in the Hartford area, which will lead to actual subsidized employment. 

If this initiative proves successful it should be expanded, because society benefits much more from men and women working in or at a machine shop, construction site, or office setting rather than sitting in a jail cell.