Sustain S.C.'s prisons

South Carolina's prison system is facing budget difficulties that it can't resolve without more cash or a major policy shift in sentencing that will reduce costs substantially. The Legislature can't expect the Department of Corrections to keep struggling on.

By making targeted budget cuts last November, legislators hoped to largely spare the state prison system, which has been operating at a deficit for the past two years. But the reprieve was short-lived, and a continuing decline in state revenue has put Corrections in a $36 million hole.

The financial problem is threatening security at state prisons. Jon Ozmint, director of the Department of Corrections, told a House committee last week that the department needs more money for essentials, including weapons, razor wire and bulletproof vests. Some of the firearms carried by guards are so old that replacement parts are no longer made.

"We've got to replace some of those or we literally are not going to have weapons on our perimeter, not going to have weapons in our vehicles," Mr. Ozmint said.

Protective vests worn by prison guards were provided secondhand by other law enforcement agencies and are worn out.

The department needs to replace razor wire that's so old and brittle that it can be broken by hand.

Corrections already has cut more than $4 million out of its budget for the current year, and there's not much expectation for more economies. The state prison system currently operates at one of the lowest per-inmate costs in the nation. Mr. Ozmint reasonably has asked the Legislature to restore funding in its next budget.

Without legislative assistance, the department's financial problems ultimately can be expected to force employee furloughs, inmate releases and prison closings.

The Legislature could help matters by providing alternative sentencing that will keep many nonviolent offenders out of prison. And it should look at revising mandatory minimum sentences for serious crimes.

Currently, prisoners convicted of violent crimes carrying sentences of up to 20 years are required to serve 85 percent of their time. Mr. Ozmint has described that percentage as arbitrary, and has suggested that prison costs could be substantially cut by reducing it to, say, 70 percent of the sentence, with good behavior.

Doing so could reduce the expense of operating prisons and prevent further cuts that the prison system can't sustain. Mr. Ozmint has correctly declined to reduce the staffing level for prison security any further.

Mr. Ozmint has imposed a bare-bones operation upon the prison system, with prisoners growing much of their own food and living on a monotonous, frugal diet. How frugal?

Try $1.47 a day per inmate.

The Legislature should look for systematic ways to sustain the prison system. Corrections should be allowed to do its job without following a radical course of forced furloughs, inmate releases and prison closings. Secure prisons are fundamental to the state's duty to provide for public safety.