Why Prisoners’ Families Aren’t Supported by Prisoners’ Earnings.—Editorially the Boston Herald says:
“When the new prison commissioner advocates the dedication of the earnings of the prisoner to the support of his family, or, if he has no family, that they should be held for his benefit when he is released, he is proposing to load upon the State a charge which it ought not to bear. The State is entitled to the proceeds of the labor of its prisoners. With the handicaps which have been imposed upon prison labor by legislation such labor is not and cannot be self-supporting. The goods that prisoners make are excluded from the general market. Power machines are forbidden, for the most part, except in wood workings. Take the State farm, where the conditions are such that, if anywhere, the institution could be made self-supporting. With all possible use made of prison labor the average cost for the care of inmates above the proceeds of this work is in the neighborhood of $2.50 per week. Of course the able-bodied short-term men come nearer than that to self-support. But that is the average outlay for maintenance, allowing nothing for interest on the plant. The State has been put to the cost of ferreting out the criminal, arresting, trying, and convicting him. The State must provide for his safe-keeping, clothe him, feed him, shelter him with proper warmth. Under restrictions surrounding prison labor he will not nearly meet the expense to which he has subjected the State. If his family need support while he is imprisoned, let the municipality provide that. With all the work he can do, the criminal is a burden to the Commonwealth. The State is entitled to all he can do towards self-support.”
Parole In Kentucky.—According to the Louisville Herald, since the State Prison South was converted into a State reformatory sixteen years ago, 4,670 prisoners have been paroled, of whom 2,666 have received final discharges. During the parole period the sentences of 295 expired. Six hundred violated their paroles and were returned to the institution. Five hundred and eighty-nine are parole violators and are at large: 433 are still reporting, and seventy-eight have died while at large.
Out of each hundred paroled, twenty-six have violated their agreement; fifty-seven have received their final discharge; two died; the terms of six expired while on parole.
The paroled men have earned $1,315,642.76, and it cost $1,143,078.64 to maintain them, a difference in favor of the State of $172,564.26.
The Kansas State Prison Makes Money.—According to the Leavenworth, Kansas, Post, the State prison at Lansing saved the State about one half million dollars during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1913. This, according to those who should know, is a very conservative estimate. It represents about one-half of the appropriation asked for by the warden to be used in constructing the new penitentiary. The twine and brick plants and the coal mine are the different departments where the most of the saving was made.
The twine plant supplied the farmers of Kansas with three million dollars worth of twine last year at nine and one-half cents a pound. This represents a net profit of $32,000, which went into the State treasury. If the farmers had been forced to buy from outside dealers at eleven cents a pound it would have cost them $45,000 more. This $45,000 and the $32,000 profit, represents a total of $77,000 saved the citizens of Kansas in twine.
The prison burns its own brick and lime and supplies brick to the different institutions over the state. The prison brickyard manufactured, for the use of State institutions in 1912, 1,623,447 brick of different grades. The prison received credit on the brick account for $12,098. This was an average of about $2 a thousand less than the same quality of brick sold for on the market. If these different institutions had been forced to buy on the open market, the cost to the State would have been about $15,344. This does not take into consideration the brick used in the construction of the new twine plant and other small buildings in the prison yard.
The coal mine is the big money maker for the State. Last year the different institutions received 31,000 tons of coal from the prison, for which the prison was credited with $77,500—$2.50 per ton. It is said if the State had been forced to buy this coal on the open market, together with the twenty thousand tons it takes annually to run the prison, it would have cost the State at least $155,000. Some estimates have placed the amount as high as one-quarter million dollars. If the prison had new quarters it is said that the annual maintenance appropriation could be safely cut from $105,000 to $50,000, as the saving in fuel alone would run into the thousands of dollars.
The construction of the new twine plant is another instance of economy where the Kansas citizens profited. With prison brick, lime and labor, this plant, consisting of two buildings, will have cost the State, when completed, $60,000 less than a similar plant constructed by a sister State. The two plants are identical in size except the Kansas plant contains two more machines than its neighbor’s.