Word: prisoners
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Connecticut, the department of correction is experimentally using two National Guard barracks as a temporary jail for drunken drivers. In Missouri and Oregon, prison authorities have renovated mental hospitals to house convicted felons. In New Jersey, where inmates have been sleeping in gymnasiums, classrooms and a chapel, officials are considering buying a World War II Navy troopship to use as a prison. Meanwhile, New York City is readying a second decommissioned Staten Island ferryboat to moor alongside the Vernon C. Bain, which has housed up to 162 prisoners on the East River since March...
Across the nation, law-enforcement officials are considering all sorts of imaginative and even outlandish ideas as they struggle with an endemic problem: the exploding U.S. prison population. Between 1980 and 1986, the inmate total shot up 78%, to nearly 550,000. In a dramatic protest against the incarceration crisis, the sheriff of Pulaski County, Ark., last week chained 50 prisoners, including 13 women, to trees outside the state prison at Pine Bluff because authorities said there was no room inside. Embarrassed officials quickly found space in the 696-bed complex, which is now officially operating at full capacity...
Budget constraints and long lead times for the construction of additional penitentiary space have helped spur the hunt for alternative prison sites. Corrections officials are also being prodded by judges: in 1986, at least 32 states were operating under court orders to reduce overcrowding in facilities. But an even bigger cause is the space crunch resulting from tougher sentences. "Until the public changes its mind on putting people away for long years, we're going to have a serious problem," predicts C. Paul Phelps, head of Louisiana's corrections department, which has 3,500 prisoners backed up in local jails...
Some of the solutions under consideration are vaguely reminiscent of the 18th century, when the English crowded thousands of prisoners into the hulks of abandoned ships. New York State, for example, hopes to be the successful bidder this month on the 870-passenger F.A.B. Pursuivant, a British troop barge. State officials want to use the vessel as a prison for 700 minimum- security offenders. The potential savings are considerable: as much as 70% over a comparable building, which would cost $50 million to construct. New York City's floating detention centers, says Ruby Ryles, a city corrections department official...
Nowhere is the problem more acute than in depressed Texas, where a revenue squeeze has forced lawmakers to limit the rate of prison expansion. The prison system, with a theoretical maximum capacity of 40,476, has been closed to new arrivals 17 times in 1987, most recently last week. Last spring authorities were forced to release some 1,000 inmates ahead of schedule. Even with quarters for 5,500 more prisoners in the planning stage, the state is still on the hunt for additional rooms at low-budget costs. Says Andy Collins, deputy director of operations for the prison system...