Ontario jail plan will be costly

But Ontarians will be no safer despite huge per household expense

By: Reuel S. Amdur

  Ontario is initiating a new system in corrections. It will mean that prisoners will have to earn their right to what is now the usual one-third reduction of a sentence in early release. While the exact financial impact of this program cannot be predicted, since it is unclear how may inmates will be denied early release, the cost will be high.
  Simply put, longer sentences mean more prisoners at any one time. They also mean more and bigger correctional facilities. If no one earned early release, it would be necessary to increase holding capacity by a third. If half earned it, the increase would be a sixth.
  Rob Sampson, who recently had to step down as Corrections Minister because an assistant named young offenders in the House, also promises "a zero tolerance drug policy." Such a policy excludes a clean-needles program. Since provincial correctional facilities are short-term (up to two years), the drug users will soon be back on the street, and they will then share the ills which they contracted from dirty needles with the people they interact with in the community.
 

To achieve a 10% reduction in crime by use of prisons will cost an additional $500 in annual household taxes

  Rui Brum, spokesman for Norm Sterling, the current Minister, argued that we should "not give up" on drug users in prison by providing clean needles or bleach kits. Instead, the government will test for drugs and conduct regular searches. To the suggestion that the approach undertaken will lead to increased AIDS and hepatitis C, both in prison and in the wider community, he said, "That remains to be seen."
  Sampson is quoted as saying that he wants "a tough, humane, no-frills prison system... which no one will want to call home." It is hard to visualize all that in practice. What does "no-frills" mean? Stockwell Day and others created quite a stir over a photo of Karla Homolka smiling at a birthday party. Does he mean that inmates will never be given a cause to smile? ... that they will constantly feel uncomfortable? If so, we can look forward to an increase of suicide, mental illness, and violence in correctional facilities.
  From my experiences working at Seaton House in Toronto, Canada's largest men's shelter, I can say with certainty that conditions would have to be very terrible indeed for "no one" to want to call a facility home. A number of old men chose to stay at Seaton House and resisted efforts to get them to move, even though they were picked on and robbed of money and tobacco by younger residents. What "humane" methods does he plan to use to make correctional facilities so undesirable that "no one" wants to be there?
  Brum responded to such observations by saying that the jails would not be luxurious and would not be family places. They would serve to punish and rehabilitate. They would have no recreation centres.
  In Ontario, it costs around $51,000 a year to incarcerate someone. Federal community supervision of an offender costs $13,000, and it would be reasonable to assume a provincial figure in the same range. Provincial figures for community supervision are not available because of widely varying reporting requirements, some by phone, some in person. Brum indicates that Ontario will not be using halfway houses for pre-release programs. Considering costs, would it not make more sense to have more and better care in the community rather than more and bigger correctional facilities?
  The drug abuse aspect of the new policy will certainly mean a substantial increase in costs. According to an Ontario government press release, "83 per cent of adult inmates. . .and 61 per cent of adult offenders serving sentences in the community are found to have some degree of alcohol or drug dependency." Such persons will now be serving a full term if caught using.
 

California's spending on incarceration budgets zoomed 9% of the budget to 17% between 1994 to 2002. Higher education dropped from 12% to 1% of its budget.

  This "tough, humane" system will mean a major shift in government spending. Since Sampson doesn't want to "import the mistakes of other jurisdictions", he and his replacement might well consider the soaring costs in California, another "tough" jurisdiction. The International Centre for the Prevention of Crime estimates that California's budgets from 1994 to 2002 will show an increase in the expenditures for incarceration from 9% of the budget to 17% and a reduction on higher education from 12% to 1%. Brum indicated that the Tory government is committed to expenditures of half a billion on new jail construction. He claims that, contrary to the California experience, money will be saved in the long run as a result of this initiative. Don't hold your breath.
  With an incarceration rate of 133 per 100,000 population, Canada is at a high level among Western nations, though the United States tops us with 600. Will we be safer following the American lead, or should we be looking at what the Netherlands is doing. Their rate is 60, less than half ours.
  By the way, did you know that it is not unusual for people serving time on weekends to go to their local facility on Friday night only to be sent home again? There is not enough room for them, even before the Tory "reforms". Brum was unaware that people are sent home in these circumstances. He stated that such practices are against policy. Ideology comes face to face with reality.
  Irvin Waller, Professor of Criminology at the University of Ottawa and till recently Director General of the International Centre for Prevention of Crime, was asked to comment on the new Ontario directions and on the interview with Rui Brum. While Brum stated that "Public safety is the Ontario government's top concern," Waller charged that investing more money in prisons puts dollars in the wrong place to provide cost-effective safety for the people of the province.
  "Research shows that, to achieve a 10% reduction in crime by use of prisons will cost an additional $500 in annual household taxes," he noted, "while taking preventive measures with at-risk young people will have the same result at a cost of $40 to $50. This investment also helps more of these youngsters to become contributing citizens and good parents."
  Waller was appalled by plans to eliminate recreation centres in jails and to eliminate half-way house programs. "Cutting out physical exercise that builds self-image and self-esteem and abolishing half-way houses which help to ease people back into the community constitute a policy of cutting off your nose to spite your face," he charged.
  His judgment of Ontario's new plan? "I predict that we will experience a substantial increase in the cost of corrections. Building more jails and putting more people in for longer periods will mean less safety in our homes, in our schools, and on the streets. Money spent on prevention is much more cost effective."

Reuel S. Amdur is a social worker and freelance writer living in Val-des-Monts, Quebec.

Posted: February 26, 2001

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