This letter in the DH is spot-on:
More prisons don’t help
About Mannix’s measures: It must be tough being a genius. The answer to Oregon’s problems: more prisons.
Of course. Why am I not surprised? Probably because I’ve been to prison six times. Why? Well, let me give you the very short version: Because prison isn’t what’s going to keep me from going back to what put me there, to what I know.
What a lot of prisoners don’t know is how to get a job, make a resume and set goals. No one wants to hire a felon. Why not build work release centers instead of prisons? Why not try to help people get on the right track to leading a productive, normal life? How about more transitional leave programs? Programs that require inmates to be employed or in school 40 hours a week within the first 30 days of being released and for 90 days (total) or they will return to prison for the remainder of their sentence.
More prisons will not stop the rising rate of crime in Oregon. Wouldn’t the residents of Oregon rather have a more positive say in how their tax dollars are spent on the people that are stealing their belongings and victimizing them? Would they rather see something done to deter criminals from returning to their dysfunctional lives?
Anyone who responds to this in regards to me and not the issue at hand isn’t any smarter than I was when I made the choices that put me here.
Sheli Starr, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, Wilsonville
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