Pushback against DOC cuts builds

Just about everyone now acknowledges that the cuts in DOC Community Corrections are a threat to public safety and other alternatives are needed to avoid what the Seattle P-I reported "are a tragedy waiting to happen."
The P-I, KIRO radio in Seattle, the Seattle Times, KHQ TV in Spokane and other media outlets have shed light on the harmful DOC cuts. It shows they will not be swept under the rug and the public is beginning to realize the billions in cuts imposed by the Legislature are harming them personally.

The P-I reports that since July, the Department of Corrections has ended community supervision of nearly 10,000 offenders deemed low-risk. DOC Secretary Eldon Vail told the P-I that translated to 60 layoffs so far in Community Corrections, "but we're going to get to about 250 layoffs in Community Corrections within the next month or so."

Further cuts may be coming as the state faces another $1.7 billion deficit.

But other sensible solutions are entering the public debate. The P-I reported one source as saying "there are billions spent for outdated tax loopholes, and eliminating or delaying those would be better than trimming from a Corrections staff that's already down to the bone."

The other cuts have come from Senate Bill 5288, "the legislation that ended the supervision of thousands of offenders (and) also reduced the community-custody terms for higher risk offenders, such as sexual predators and people convicted of violent crimes," the P-I reported.

On top of pressure from the union, Seattle City Council members, five area mayors, five county sheriffs, Seattle's police chief and the U.S. marshals recently signed a joint letter to Gov. Chris Gregoire and Vail to protest some of the cuts.

Vail told the P-I: "We try to make the best decisions we can to do the least damage to public safety." He added: "I am pretty concerned about, if there is another round of reductions that we can't yet articulate or identify, because we are really down now to supervising - particularly in Community Corrections - the highest risk offenders. I don't know who else to get rid of."