Bad budgeting, neglect produced Corrections deficit

THE LATEST BUDGET shortfall expected by the Department of Corrections is a result of a more troublesome deficit: our Legislature’s inability — or refusal — to provide for the needs of this state.

Corrections, overlooked and neglected even more than most agencies, is asking the Budget and Control Board to allow it to run a $4.3 million deficit this fiscal year, which ends June 30. Short of that, the agency, which has never been adequately funded and suffered multiple reductions from 1999 to 2003, will have to cut back even more.

In fiscal year 2004, Corrections ran a $23.7 million deficit. From 2001 through 2004, it ran a total of $57.5 million over budget.

This year’s projected shortfall is just the beginning of Corrections’ problems. Medical care, food and fuel costs at the department are up $8 million this year, and as anyone who has bought those products lately knows, that trend will continue. The agency has raided its salary budget to pay those bills, meaning that the already woefully understaffed agency is putting off filling needed positions. Corrections chief Jon Ozmint says he has 1,500 fewer officers than he should; prisons are alarmingly underguarded.

The fact that the Legislature has again short-changed Corrections is old news. South Carolina’s prisons fall pitifully short of the support and resources they need to assure the safety of the public, guards and inmates.

Senate Finance Chairman Hugh Leatherman believes the problem lies in Corrections and wants an investigation into its budget. Fine. But at some point Mr. Leatherman and his fellow lawmakers must stop seeking a scapegoat and look in the mirror. The General Assembly has chosen to lock up far too many people while running one of the cheapest prison systems in the country; today, it is the cheapest (so good luck finding those savings). That’s a good way to become the most dangerous, because an understaffed prison is one with an increased chance of escapes, riots and assaults on guards.

Gov. Mark Sanford blames Corrections’ immediate budget problems on lawmakers’ override of a budget veto last year. Legislators had required the Corrections Department to absorb more inmates from county jails. Allowing that change to become law over his veto cost the agency $1.2 million, Mr. Sanford said.

But there’s an even bigger problem looming, as he rightly notes. The Corrections Department is almost certain to run a deficit next year if the Legislature goes ahead with its current budget plan, which cuts its already inadequate allocation. The Education Department will be in the same fix, since lawmakers are refusing to provide enough money to fuel school buses. To head off problems expected next year, Mr. Ozmint is considering closing three minimum-security facilities. But he warns that could lead to inmates being crowded into higher-security prisons, which invites court intervention.

Even if it’s constitutional, this is deficit spending, pure and simple. And it’s no way to run a state.

It’s bad enough for lawmakers to pass a budget that fails to meet the needs of the Corrections Department — or any other agency. It’s worse to do so knowing the money will have to be spent anyway. It’s time lawmakers plugged their deficit and reworked their budget to acknowledge the cost of their policies.