SD Inmate Population on the Decline
The once rapid growth in South Dakota’s prison population has been significantly slowed thanks largely to efforts to keep parolees from returning to prison. The state Corrections Department expects only a slight increase in the number of state penitentiary inmates this fiscal year thanks to programs aimed at helping them prepare for life after prison. Reported by the Rapid City Journal.
Inmate counts have leveled off the past five years after a seven-year period when the average daily inmate count grew by 41 percent, from 2,424 inmates in July 1999 to 3,428 in July 2006.
“We’re growing, but we’re growing at a really moderate pace,” said Laurie Feiler, deputy secretary of the state Department of Corrections.
She told an interim legislative committee last week that the average daily inmate count from July 2009 through May this year was 3,448.
The availability of federal grants and the increasing annual state expense for a growing inmate population helped shift the emphasis to keeping inmates from re-offending or violating parole and returning to prison, said state Sen. Julie Bartling, chair of the South Dakota Corrections Commission.
“Plus I think there’s been a societal focus,” she said. “I think the focus has changed that we need to get the inmates – men and women – back in their homes and back with their children and their families so they can be productive citizens and hopefully be good examples for others in their community,” she said.
The number of new prisoners and parole violators at the women’s prison is down this fiscal year. There are fewer parole violators among the men, but more first-time offenders.
The average length of stay – 14 months for women and 20 months for men – is changed little from a year ago.
A May report showed that 38 percent of the inmates convicted of violent crimes were in prison for rape or aggravated assault. For nonviolent crimes, the largest percentage of inmates (12 percent) were there for possession of a controlled substance.
Bartling, D-Burke, said it’s important that the state continue to fund Corrections Department programs to provide education or General Educational Development (GED) classes to inmates.
“That’s an area that I think money could be very well spent, and just continuing some educational opportunities. … I’m a firm believer all the way around that a good education is a very strong part of a person’s life and ability to make good for themselves and their families” she said.
Part of the reason for a leveling off in the prison count is a state population that is growing older. Young people are most often those at risk to commit crimes, Feiler said.
Programs that target an inmate’s specific needs, such as ending methamphetamine use, also are helping, she said.
Gov. Mike Rounds has created the Re-entry Council to look for ways to keep released inmates from committing another crime. The state’s recidivism, or re-offending rate, is 30 percent.
Feiler said the DOC might relax some policies if that can help minimize parole violations. For example, it might be better for some parolees to have family support and be without a job than to require that they have both a place to live and a job, she said.
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