Affordable prison reform

Pressure to balance the state budget should put prison reform efforts on the front burner. Problems with prison overcrowding have been festering for years in Ohio. If it takes a budget crisis to initiate cost-saving solutions, so be it.

A new report that details how much the state is spending to imprison nonviolent inmates could be the catalyst for legislative change. The study by the Justice Center of the Council of State Governments cites the expense of incarcerating low-level drug offenders and the need to develop strategies to deal with them more effectively.

The report says lower-level offenders don't stay in prison long enough to benefit from correctional programs, but consume about $189 million a year in prison space. Targeted programs provide a better, cost-saving alternative to prison without jeopardizing public safety, the study says.

That's encouraging to state Sen. Bill Seitz, who has sponsored legislation to ease prison overcrowding through measures that would divert more low-level inmates to community options, such as electronic monitoring and drug treatment. The Cincinnati Republican also wants to allow some inmates to shave time off their sentences by participating in prison education and treatment programs.

Two factors could advance reform that might otherwise be shelved in the GOP-controlled state Senate: The next state budget could have an $8 billion hole after one-time federal stimulus funding expires. And Ohio prisons that now hold about 50,000 inmates — or 33 percent more than they're designed to house — are projected to incarcerate more than 53,000 offenders in a few years.

A state with a new budget that could be seriously out of balance can't afford to build prisons. But it can seize the opportunity to re-evaluate prison sentencing and address overcrowding through the efficient use of available community tools: halfway houses, mental health treatment, and local drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs.

It's time.