The Daily Grand and Sundry

 California Governor Proposes Building Prisons In Mexico

by Wyatt Buchanan,The San Francisco Chronicle

 SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Monday that the state could save $1 billion by building and operating prisons in Mexico to house undocumented felons who are currently imprisoned in California.

The governor floated the idea during an appearance at the Sacramento Press Club in response to a question about controlling state spending. His speech came on the same day that changes in prisoner parole and credits for time served took effect.

“We pay them to build the prisons down in Mexico and then we have those undocumented immigrants be down there in a prison. … And all this, it would be half the cost to build the prisons and half the cost to run the prisons,” Schwarzenegger said, predicting it would save the state $1 billion that could be spent on higher education.

About 19,000 of the state’s 171,000 prisoners are illegal immigrants, according to the most recent statistics available online. The state spends more than $8 billion a year on the prison system.

Aaron McLear, spokesman for the governor, said later that Schwarzenegger’s comments did not represent a concrete proposal, but “a concept somebody mentioned to him” and he could not say where the governor came up with the $1 billion figure.

The governor’s statements seemed to catch his prisons chief off guard. Matthew Cate, secretary of the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said it was not a proposal the department was pursuing and he assumed it was an extension of Schwarzenegger’s call to privatize some of the state’s prison operations.”

I HAVE BEEN CAMPAIGNING FOR THIS INNOVATION FOR OVER A YEAR; this is from my September 1, 2009 blog, RAISE MONEY FOR CALIFORNIA

1-Build Prisons for Illegal Mexican Prisoners warehoused in our California Judicial System in Mexico,outsource the warehousing of alien prisoners.

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=1777

The DAILY GRAND and SUNDRY also advocated this approach in May 2009, MOURNING BECOMES CALIFORNIA, YES WE ARE BROKE

http://gerrymaxeyworkshop.com/blogging/?p=930

 If the Governor needs to flesh out the plan, here are my original ideas.

Estimates show that half of California’s prison population is made up of illegals.

17 percent of the federal prison population is illegals, though they are only 3 percent of the total population.

National Institute of Corrections, Federal Bureau of Prisons, June 2003.

 

I submit, that to address this problem, California enter into an extraterritorial agreement with Mexico.

 

California will finance the building and maintaining  of prisons in remote areas of Mexico to allow illegal immigrants, convicted of crimes in California from Mexico to serve their penal time  in Mexico.

The penal staff will be  Mexican citizens; the prisoners will serve their sentences according to California law, and California legal standards.

 

Upside RISK

1-It will cut costs in the California penal system

2-It will cut over crowding in the California penal system.

3-It will provide a well built infrastructure in Mexico

4-It will provide well paying jobs in Mexico.

5-It will disincentize Mexican criminals from coming to the United States, in that they won’t be released after prison in the US.

6- Released Mexican prisoners will be released into the Mexican general population, not into the American population.  

7- It will upgrade Mexico’s image by portraying it as a willing partner. in controlling cross border crime.

8-It will highlight that NAFTA means more than just the death of the Mexican farmer, it means cooperation on all issues.

9-It could also work in Honduras and El Salvador, which are also supplying large amounts of illegal immigrant criminals. 

TED LIEU

I firmly believe we can innovate ourselves out of this mess, both by concept and process. The Governor, along with the best  candidate for Attorney General and a real hope for the future of California, Ted Lieu, can lead us.

Tags: California, California Prisons, El Salvador, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Honduras, Mexico, Ted Lieu

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 27th, 2010 at 12:36 am and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.