By James Call
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wfsu/local-wfsu-958243.mp3
Tallahassee, FL – A Senate panel is preparing to cut the budget for prisons and courts by 275 million dollars. James Call reports more than half of the savings will come out of the Department of Corrections budget.
The Criminal Justice subcommittee made time Thursday for lobbyists to explain why different segments of the judicial system, the courts, the prosecutors the prisons needed more money. Julie Ann Holt represents the public defenders association and she was explaining how trust money is split between state attorneys and public defenders when Chairman Mike Fasano interrupted.
"If I may. I'm enjoying this this morning. By the way. The state attorney, the public defender and the court are arguing with each other. This is great stuff."
"We do it in the courtroom all the time."
"I know, this is great. I love it."
Fasano is in charge of writing the budget for the Judiciary. Economists say tax collections will come in about four billion dollars short of maintaining current spending levels during the next year. Leaders have determined that Judiciary's share of the shortfall is 275-million dollars. Fasano has a draft budget. More than 60-percent of the cuts will come out at the expense of the Department of Corrections. After listening to representatives for the courts, prosecutors, public defenders and prison nurses, Fasano instructed committee members to review the draft over the weekend.
"To come back and suggest any changes that they believe they can make to the budget that will continue to reduce it by 275-million dollars. We have to reduce our budget in this committee because we have to tighten our belts because we have less money than we had last year. Unlike in Washington we don't have the luxury of printing presses to print money whenever they are short of dollars. We got to balance our budget and we have to reduce it by 275-million."
To get there, Fasano proposes privatizing inmate health care, including medical, dental, pharmacy and mental health plans. The draft also cuts 85 corrections positions, wardens, assistant wardens but not officers. Governor Scott had promised to trim corrections budget by a billion. This week, DOC secretary Edwin Buss released a plan to close three prisons to save 30-million dollars. Fasano said Buss is within his authority to close prisons but he wants to protect the jobs of prison guards.
"I appreciate his trying to look into saving tax dollars. He's made it very clear to me which I have made it very clear to him that I don't want one correctional officer to lose his or her job and he has made it clear to me that no one would lose their job as far as a correctional officer is concerned."
Lobbyists are not so sure. The Department of Corrections operates 62 prisons and 45 work camps. A reshuffling of the system could force some workers to choose between relocating far from their current home or quitting. The biggest savings from the justice committees proposal comes from privatizing health care for the systems 102,000 inmates. It would save more than 70-million dollars. A prison nurse told committee members that previous attempts failed to save any money and may have actually cost the state money but Fasano remained unconvinced.
"When you give a department a budget and you tell them in that budget that we expect you save X number of dollars because of privatizing mental health, pharmaceuticals and dental services they got to come up with that savings. So they are going to have to bid out the project out to try and get the best price they can get for the taxpayers. It is going to be in the budget how much money they will have to save when they privatize these services."
The emerging Senate plan differs from the one offered by Governor Rick Scott in February. The governor proposed savings by eliminating 1600 positions and moving inmates into private prisons. Senator JD Alexander chairs the Senate Budget Committee. He's in his third year as chairman and every spring he immerses himself in the budget writing process. He describes writing the spending plan for the state of Florida as a group project.
"That's the way our constitution is designed. It is designed so that we have a public conversation about these expenditures. That's what all the transparency and all the other things we celebrate as part of the political process is that it helps make a better process is all predicated on having a broad political discussion about these decisions and not having any sole unilateral decision. Nat sound line 151 is funding for."
Those discussions are happening in committee rooms across the Capitol Complex. Fasano's committee split up the budget for the District Court of Appeals into five sections. He's sending a message to the first DCA. He's cutting its budget by six percent as punishment for the construction of a new courthouse critics say is lavish and call a Taj Mahal.
"I'm a big believer members that you don't reward bad behavior and I feel confident when I tell you with some bad behavior that was done at the first district court of appeals and you don't reward that and because of that they will see a reduction in their budget but we did not reduce the budget of the other four
district court of appeals."
Friday state economists will produce a report telling lawmakers how big next year's budget shortfall is. Then Legislative leaders will determine allocation for the different sections of next year's spending plan. Lawmakers have until May to write a budget for the fiscal year beginning July first.