Appropriations Committee will soon vote on Governor Blunt’s Budget Recommendations

Governor’s Budget Favors Laptop Computers over Public Safety

Members of this committee need to know that this
spending is inappropriate and hurts public safety.

The House Appropriations Committee on Public Safety and Corrections is poised to vote on Governor’s Blunt’s budget recommendations for fiscal year 2009.   In his budget the governor is recommending that monies earmarked by state law explicitly for helping ex-offenders successfully re-enter society be used instead to fund laptop computers and other administrative needs of the Department of Corrections. 

Governor Blunt has recommended that $10,454,180 be transferred from the inmate revolving fund to be used for a new offender information management system within the Department of Corrections.  Governor Blunt likewise recommended that $2,473,848 be transferred from the inmate revolving fund for laptops for Probation and Parole officers. 

Monies in the inmate revolving fund are primarily derived from the collection of an intervention fee assessed on probationers and parolees.  Probation and Parole indicates that the intervention fee generates an average of $1.2 million a month for the inmate revolving fund. 

According to state statute the intervention fee is to be used to provide community corrections and intervention services for offenders that will assist them to successfully complete probation, parole or conditional release.

Offenders, not taxpayers, pay the intervention fee.  This fee was established to help with programs and services such as drug treatment, employment, housing, and mental health services that will help offenders return successfully.  All of our communities are safer when an ex-offender successfully returns to society as a law-abiding citizen.

In his 2009 budget Governor Blunt recommends that only $2.1 million be used from the inmate revolving fund to fund probation and parole services that directly impact ex-offenders in the community. 

 
ACTION: 
Call or e-mail members of the House Appropriations Committee TODAY and let them know that monies collected from the intervention fee should be used to fund services for ex-offenders, not for administrative needs of the Department of Corrections.

MESSAGE:  
All of our communities are safer when an ex-offender successfully returns to society as a law-abiding citizen.  Missouri statute indicates that the intervention fee collected from ex-offenders should be used on programs and services that help them re-enter society.  It is inappropriate to spend these funds on items that benefit the Department of Corrections.  Technological improvements for the Department of Corrections should come out of general revenue as an expense of state government.