San Francisco Concerned Over Prison Realignment Funds
SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS) – District Attorneys and other law enforcement officials from around the Bay Area got together at Hastings Law School in San Francisco Wednesday to talk "realignment." They're worried about two things: money and public safety.
San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon hosted this realignment meeting, noting that the state is in the middle of a transformation of the entire criminal justice system, with a plan to dump 23 percent of the state inmate populations on counties, without reimbursing counties for the total cost.
KCBS' Barbara Taylor Reports:
"One of the things that we all recognize is that the funding necessary to make a lot of this work isn't necessarily going to be here," said Gascon.
That's problem number one, but these DAs said there's also the issue of public safety to consider.
"Our concern is about protection of the public, and that's what we're going to do," said San Mateo DA Steve Wagstaff.
We're going to be dealing with a lot of offenders that won't go to state prison regardless of the number of times that they offend or re-offend," said Sonoma District Attorney Jill Ravitch.
The state plans to begin transferring low level offenders to county jails at the beginning of October to meet a federal court mandate to reduce California's prison population.
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