MI sees 2nd-highest drop in prisoners

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) - Michigan saw the second-largest drop in state prisoner population among the 50 states between 2008 and 2009 -- both in number of prisoners and percentage, according to a Pew Center on the States report released this week.

The state held 3,260 fewer prisoners in 2009 than in 2008, a drop of 6.7 percent, according to the Prison Count 2010 report. Only California had a higher overall drop, shedding 4,257 prisoners, and only Rhode Island saw a larger percentage decrease: 9.2 percent. The overall decrease among U.S. states was 0.4 percent.

The large drops in Michigan's prison population are not unexpected, given the state's controversial push to release more prisoners who have completed their minimum sentence and are deemed safe for release.

But what Michigan is doing "is similar to a number of states," said Richard Jerome of the Pew Center for the States. One aspect of the changes at the Michigan Department of Corrections is more unique, he said.

"Even in this context of a fiscal crisis that Michigan is facing probably more than any other state, there is still a reinvestment of dollars into recividism reduction programs and re-entry," Jerome said.

While decreasing overall spending from $2.04 billion in 2008-09 to $1.92 billion in 2009-10 -- a $120 million savings -- the Michigan Department of Corrections increased spending by $23 million on its Prisoner Re-entry Initiative. The program is aimed at preventing released prisoners from committing new crimes.

State Corrections Director Patricia Caruso, who serves on the board of national corrections organizations, gets questions from other state corrections leaders "all the time, because we're doing what everybody wants to do and that's lower the prison population, lower the corrections cost and at the same time, increase public safety," department spokesman Russ Marlan said.

Over the three years during which the state's prison population dropped by more than 6,500, Michigan crime rates have gone down, Marlan said.

Kent County Prosecuting Attorney William Forsyth does not dispute that statistic, but said the state's violent crime rate remains the highest in the Midwest. Michigan has the fewest police officers per capita, the prosecutor said.

And he said the state is not achieving significant savings in exchange for releasing thousands of prisoners.

"It's negligible," Forsyth said of the 2009-10 corrections budget $120 million smaller than the $2.04 billion 2008-09 budget.

While the prisoner population keeps "going down, nobody seems to address the issue of cost per prisoner," the prosecutor said. Michigan spends roughly $33,000 per prisoner per year, compared to $25,000 on average in Midwest states, he said.

Forsyth has other concerns.

"They're letting violent people out," he said, noting he has a list of more than a dozen homicide defendants the state is considering releasing.