In a clear and potentially significant shift in state policy, a House budget panel on Wednesday began assembling a sweeping prison reform package that hinges on keeping thousands of Texas lawbreakers out of prison.

 

Instead of earmarking millions to pay for new prisons and leased prison beds to hold a growing population of new convicts, lawmakers discussed a tradeoff: Figure out what the new beds would cost, then allow prison officials to spend much of that money on expanded probation programs, rehabilitation and drug treatment services that would give the lawbreakers a much better chance of returning to the streets as law-abiding citizens -- and are much cheaper.

 

"We're talking about changing our whole mind-set on criminal justice, redefining and fundamentally changing the way our whole system works," said Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, who chairs the panel. "We simply don't have the money to continue building more and more new prisons that will just fill up and then make us build even more.

 

"We can't afford that system any more."

 

Gov. Rick Perry joined the debate, labeling new prisons as last on his list of justice priorities.

 

"There are better, more efficient ways to deal with this prison population than going and building more prisons," he said.

 

Under the plan, older and infirm inmates who pose a minimal threat to society could be transferred from prison cells to nursing home-like programs where federal Medicaid and Medicare funds could pay the bills instead of state taxpayers.

 

Not so many years ago, such public talk about spending big money on alternatives to prison, in a state that prides itself as being tough on crime, would have stood little chance of passing.

 

Ann del Llano, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, said she is heartened by the shift in legislators' sentiments. "Unlike other areas of state government, these solutions in criminal justice can pay for themselves," she said. "But I think the public is ready to see treatment, not prisons, and that's why you're seeing this happen."

 

House Corrections Committee Chairman Jerry Madden, R-Plano, said many of the prison reforms should happen, with or without new money.

 

"We may have to build some beds because we can't create all the new programs we need overnight," he said, "but what is not going to happen this legislative session is another big prison construction program like we did 15 years ago. We're going to find a way to do this intelligently this time."

 

Under initial details outlined Wednesday, up to $62 million in additional budget funds would be earmarked to temporarily lease enough prison beds to ease an immediate crowding problem. As soon as March, officials testified, the 112 state prisons and other lockups may be full -- the first time that has occurred in more than a decade.

 

During discussions Wednesday, Rep. Pat Haggerty, R-El Paso questioned whether that money would be much better spent on probation programs, in cases of nonviolent offenders. Each prison bed costs about $40 a day; each probationer about $2.

 

Committee members nodded in agreement as they discussed diverting future funds out of prisons and into those programs.

 

Other proposals: Lower caseloads for probation officers so they can better supervise the offenders who are on the streets; provide more drug-treatment beds for probationers, so they won't have to go to prison; and provide more in-prison and community treatment programs for more mentally ill offenders, so they don't commit new crimes.

 

"This year, the recommendation we make to the Appropriations Committee has to be more than just dollars and cents," Turner said. "It's got to change the way we do business."