Governor Patrick Stumbles on Prison Policy

A letter to the editor by

co-editor Chris Sturr ran in today's Boston Globe, criticizing Deval Patrick's regressive policy to charge people convicted of crimes a fee as a way to raise money to pay for more police:

Dollars & Sense

To see the article Chris co-wrote with

collective member Liv Gold on the New York Campaign for Telephone Justice, click here; for an account of the recent activist victory for prisoners in New York, click here.

See also the orignal

article on Patrick's proposal, and an excellent critique of the proposal by

columnist Eileen McNamara.

Below are the other three letters the

ran on the issue--the two other "anti" letters are excellent; the one "pro" letter (the middle one)  is pretty mindless ("creative thinking"? puh-leeze!).

Thanks to Lois Ahrens of the Real Cost of Prisons Project for compiling these (and for all her excellent work!).