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Cost of Illegal aliens: $40 million tab for undocumented prisoners in Monterey County
Written by on January 17, 2010, 11:22 AM
Governor, local legislators want more federal funding By MIKE HORNICK, Bakersfield Californian,1/16/10 It costs California taxpayers $40 million annually to house inmates in Monterey County prisons who are in the country illegally or whose immigration status is in question. Getting more federal money to pay the cost of incarcerating such prisoners has been on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's agenda since he raised the issue with the Bush administration several years ago. Now he's turned up the volume a notch, asking this month for $880 million in federal money for undocumented inmates, part of his effort to bridge a $20 billion At the Salinas Valley State Prison and the Correctional Training Facility in It costs $53,000 annually to incarcerate each one $40 million altogether said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the department. The same cost per head applies to citizen prisoners. Sixteen percent of prisoners here are subject to the holds, compared with 13.1 percent statewide. Then there are inmates who were charged and convicted in Under an existing ICE hold, prisoners face immigration custody upon release. A potential hold means an inmate's immigration status is under investigation or yet to be determined. There are more than 22,000 such inmates in Cutting the cost burden is one issue that unites the county's Democratic legislators with the Republican governor. "Why should As it stands, the state gets $112.5 million in federal aid annually through the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program. If combined with the $880 million Schwarzenegger wants, it would come close to covering the state's $1.1 billion cost. But "It goes into the state general fund," More money, though, may not be the only solution. "I expect that it would be more cost effective for the state of The debate over federal dollars comes at a time when the state is under a federal judicial order to reduce its prison population by 40,000. "There's a link between satisfying the court order to reduce overcrowding and getting immigration holds to a federal facility," Monning said. Is there overcrowding here? "The answer isn't simple," said Lt. Eric Moore, public information officer at Salinas Valley State Prison. "When the prison was built, the idea was one inmate per cell, but each cell was built with two bunks. Both are typically filled. We're considered at over 180 percent capacity, but keeping the design in mind, we don't have overcrowding. We don't have housing in our gyms." "Some people say, 'Just deport them,' " Monning said. "But they could be back on the streets the next day." Ideally, Monning said, treaties would be reached to allow the "That would take a huge burden off New Comment |
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