PRISONS IN ILLINOIS: WHAT’S THE CURRENT STATE OF OUR CORRECTIONAL FACILITIES?

According to a Peoria Public Radio article from Aug. 19, Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez thinks Illinois prisons are becoming overcrowded and that the wrong people are being sent to prison for the wrong reasons.

Illinois’ correctional facilities have been and could continue to be in flux, but where do they stand right now?

According to the Illinois’ Comptroller’s office, the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) is the agency that spends the most on employee salaries, at almost $40 million in 2013 and with nearly 11,000 employees. According to the IDOC, the department’s budget for 2013 was more than $1 billion. And, the IDOC employee pension fund is underfunded by approximately $99 million, according to the “Price of Prisons” report from the Vera Institute of Justice.

There are 25 state correctional facilities and four federal prisons in Illinois. There are almost 50,000 adult inmates (a figure that jumps up to 75,00o when juvenile prisoners are included, according the University of Illinois at Chicago) in Illinois state prisons, with a 2012 recidivism rate of 47.1 percent, a number IDOC officials say they hope to reduce. In 2008, there were nearly 43,000 federal or state male prisoners in Illinois and almost 3,000 female prisoners, according to a report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics. According to the Vera Institute of Justice, more than $38,000 is spent on each prisoner in Illinois every year.

The first correctional facility in Illinois (prisons are state or federal facilities, jails are operated at the county or municipal level) was in built in 1818 in Crawford County, according to the IDOC. The current Department of Corrections was created in 1970 at the urging of Gov. Richard Ogilvie to make corrections procedures in the state more effective, humane and consistent.

What’s the big picture on prisoners?

The United States has more than two million incarcerated people, the most of any country, according to the International Centre for Prison Studies. Louisiana incarcerates the more than any other state, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS).  In a national study of recidivism in 30 states from 2005 to 2010 by the BJS, more than 76 percent of released prisoners were arrested again in five years, higher than Illinois’ rate of approximately 47 percent. A federal prison in Marion, one of the four in Illinois, was named the No. 10 most notorious prison by News One for its years as a supermax facility.

If Thomson Correctional Facility does open as a federal prison, Illinois’ prison population likely would increase. It would be funded by federal money, not state tax money. Durbin has championed its opening as a job-creator, according the Huffington Post.

NEXT ARTICLE: Sex offenders per capita by county in Illinois

[RECOMMENDED]

1. Cartoon: New Chicago Tribune polls have Emanuel flying low for 2015 election
2. Illinois has more top 25 violent neighborhoods than any other state
3. Does Bruce Rauner want to reduce the Illinois minimum wage?
4. Iroquois County corruption successfully rooted out
5. Want to tell your elected officials what you think of the state of government in Illinois? Use our Sound Off tool.