California, which is looking to navigate through its budget crisis amid the coronavirus pandemic, will pass the bill on to state residents by forcing them to live alongside more criminals.
The Sacramento Bee reported Tuesday that Gov. Gavin Newsom is trying to speed the closure of some state prisons.
With a projected deficit of $54 billion for the current fiscal year and the next, which begins on July 1, two of California’s 34 state prisons will be shut down, which eventually would free up $400 million annually.
Newsom also wants to see the Golden State close its three juvenile facilities to save money and further reduce its overall prison population, Fox News reported.
Rather than cut wasteful government programs or refrain from stimulating the pockets of illegal immigrants with $125 million, Newsom wants to solve his state’s budget problems by unleashing more criminals on law-abiding Californians.
That strategy, thus far, hasn’t exactly panned out.
California has released criminals back into communities by the thousands during the pandemic, according to the Los Angeles Times, and some of them have been violent sex offenders.
One of those sex offenders was arrested days after his release for allegedly exposing himself to the staff at a parole resource center in Santa Ana, KABC-TV reported.
There is also the issue of the state’s “zero bail” policy for some crimes, which has seen police having to arrest the same people over and over again.
A man was arrested last month three times in one day for allegedly stealing cars, only to be released on zero bail each time.
Another man was accused of strangling a child after his early release from jail.
With so many criminals now roaming free in the Golden State, it really makes you wonder which ones are still incarcerated and what crimes they committed.
The people who stand to be released under Newsom’s plan certainly aren’t Boy Scouts, according to one expert.
Christine Ward, the director of the Crime Victims Alliance, confirmed the worst, Fox News reported.
“We’re not talking about your small-time drug dealer. We’re talking about the most serious and violent felons in our state. That’s what’s left in our prisons,” she said.
But if Newsom gets his way, California will close the first prison sometime after the 2021 fiscal year begins, while the second prison will close a year later.
Inmates not outright released under the proposal would be able to earn their way out of prison more quickly and then would have a shorter parole duration, which would be capped at two years for most felons.
Meanwhile, sex offenders wouldn’t have to be supervised upon release for longer than 18 months.
It is a truly progressive solution for a state that already has placed a moratorium on common-sense governance.
While those who authored California’s budget for the year couldn’t foresee the economic calamity caused by a Chinese coronavirus, the state’s leaders certainly haven’t helped the economic situation by forcing people, in many cases, to refrain from earning or spending money.
In fact, the state is arresting or detaining people in droves for defying Newsom’s lockdown order by going outdoors.
More than two dozen people were arrested in Sacramento at one protest earlier this month for the crime of demanding that they get back to their lives back during the state’s strict stay-at-home order.
KCRA-TV reported the California Highway Patrol arrested 32 people for disobeying a lawful order, demonstrating without a permit and resisting or delaying a police officer.
Stories of law-abiding taxpayers being turned into criminals by California’s orders during the pandemic abound, but state lawmakers apparently have few reservations about emptying jails and prisons of hardened criminals to alleviate budget issues.
However, the state’s leaders are ignoring California’s single biggest unneeded expenditure.
The Washington Examiner reported that in 2017 alone, illegal immigrants cost California $23 billion for their use of public resources.
It would seem a no-brainer to start with cutting this unnecessary expense when attempting to overcome such a large budget deficit, but California is insistent on doubling down on releasing dangerous criminals and protecting illegal immigrants.
For a state already in such a quandary, what could go wrong?
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