Ask the Scholar
Document scope · 1 page
Scholar
Ask about this object, its catalog metadata, its source description, or the page inventory.
For page-specific OCR and visual context, open one of the page chats.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
118564930
label
[Corrections, Board of] - Coordinated California Corrections: Institutions, July 1971 (5 of 6)
core
doc
dtoType
document
citationUrl
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
118564930
contentType
document
title
[Corrections, Board of] - Coordinated California Corrections: Institutions, July 1971 (5 of 6)
citationUrl
identifierLocal
840
collections
Ronald Reagan's Governor's Papers of the Press Unit
Reports
thumbnailUrl
largeImageUrl
imageCount
1
hasImages
yes
source
import
hasTranscription
no
Source extras
naId
118564930
coverageEndDate
logicalDate
1975-12-31
year
1975
coverageStartDate
logicalDate
1967-01-01
year
1967
levelOfDescription
fileUnit
recordType
description
ocrSource
nara-archive
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
document
mediaId
1f8a0fd7be3c076d
ocrText
Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
Digital Library Collections
This is a PDF of a folder from our textual collections.
Collection: Reagan, Ronald: Gubernatorial Papers,
1966-74: Press Unit
Folder Title: [Corrections, Board of] -
Coordinated California Corrections:
Institutions, July 1971 (5 of 6)
Box: P34
To see more digitized collections visit:
https://reaganlibrary.gov/archives/digital-library
To see all Ronald Reagan Presidential Library inventories visit:
https://reaganlibrary.gov/document-collection
Contact a reference archivist at: [email protected]
Citation Guidelines: https://reaganlibrary.gov/citing
National Archives Catalogue: https://catalog.archives.gov/
- 101 -
result in a lessening of population pressures in jails as well as providing
more appropriate services to youth.
The Jail Task Force, therefore, joins with the Juvenile Institution
Task Force in making the following recommendation.
Recommendation
13. Counties should immediately begin planning and establishing
Youth Correctional Centers or similar facilities and programs as an alter-
native to jails wherever appropriate.
XIV. RECOMMENDATIONS REQUIRING ONLY ADMINISTRATIVE ACTION
The Jail Task Force made a number of observations which are perhaps
inappropriate for inclusion in the discussion of major issues and recommen-
dations, but which are nevertheless important enough to include as a part
of the overall report.
Administrator Attitudes and Quality of Program
Wherever this Task Force observed high morale, efficient functioning,
and a sense of accomplishment on the part of staff, these qualities were
directly related to the degree of concern and support demonstrated by the
top level administrator (usually the sheriff). Where these qualities were
absent or significantly reduced, staff frequently could not recall when they
had last seen their department head.
Jail staff have a most difficult job to perform, often under very poor
conditions. Regular visits by the department head, together with a strong
demonstration of interest and support on his part, are essential to creating
a climate where a good job gets done.
Recommendation. 14. To maximize improvements in staff morale, effec-
tive programming, and efficient operations, department heads should demonstrate
a greater interest in and support for those staff who are involved in the
corrections functions.
The Cloak of Secrecy
A number of jail administrators expressed the need not to hide in-
cidents which occur in the jail, such as homosexual rapes by inmates, dis-
turbances, and assaults. A few, however, felt that the less the public knows,
the better. This latter attitude, probably based on fear of public criticism,
is a very shortsighted view, because ultimately it is the community which
- 102 -
shares the responsibilities for conditions in the jail. The more the public
knows of jail conditions and problems, the more support the sheriff is likely
to receive when he asks for funds to improve conditions.
Recommendation. 15. Sheriffs and correctional facility administra-
tors should establish a policy of public relations in which the public,
through the appropriate news media, is allowed free access to facility pro-
grams, problems, and incidents.
The Correctional Officer VS the Deputy
A number of counties have established the classification of "correc-
tional officer" to take the place of the "deputy" in jail operation. This
may be a very good idea; however, two counter-productive problems appear to
be accompanying the establishment of this classification. First, it is a
dead-end classification with no provisions for career development, thereby
limiting recruitment to persons who are not looking toward the future, ex-
cept to retire, and to people who will move on to other jobs as the oppor-
tunity arises,
Secondly, the correctional officer classification was originally in-
tended to be a way to save the county money. Correctional officers are paid
up to $100 less per month than are their counterparts, the deputies. How-
ever, because it is a "dead-end" classification, most staff are at the top
step of their salary range which is above the pay, in most instances, of the
deputy in his first year of service. Thus the overall effect is that salaries
are higher for jail operations where correctional officers are employed.
Also, this difference in pay subtly tells personnel in jails that their jobs
are not as important as other functions in the sheriff's department.
Recommendation. 16. A county electing to establish a "correctional
officer" classification to staff corrections facilities should ensure that
such personnel are paid and trained at least on a level equal to that of the
"deputy sheriff" and that there are provisions for a career ladder to super-
visorial and administrative positions.
Staff Training
According to the President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Admin-
istration of Justice, training is one of the most crucial needs in the system.
The Commission has observed:
"Changing corrections into a system with significantly
increased power to reduce recidivism and prevent re-
cruitment into criminal careers will require, above
all else, a sufficient number of qualified staff to
perform the many tasks to be done. "36
- 103 -
As stated in Chapter III of this Report, one of the major concerns
of the jail staff was the lack of opportunity for training. While 35% of
the jail staff had completed at least 2 years of college, most of them re-
ported little or no opportunity to receive training specifically for the
various correctional roles they fulfilled. In fact, as stated elsewhere
in this Report, even the jail administrators felt a sense of isolation from
the mainstream of correctional efforts, and did not know what sorts of pro-
grams and staff existed even in neighboring counties. There is little doubt
of the need for in-service training for all staff in county jails. In addi-
tion, sheriffs should encourage and make provisions for their jail staff to
visit other correctional operations, both State and county. There should
be a free exchange of ideas, problems, and programs, in corrections and
detention, as there is in the detective and narcotics divisions of most
counties.
Recommendation. 17. Correctional administrators should make pro-
visions for at least supervisory and administrative corrections staff to
visit other correctional operations at both the State and county level for
the purpose of staff and program development.
XIV. DIVERTING INMATES FROM THE JAIL
Although the issue of intake is technically not within the scope of
this study, it has become apparent during data collection that the presence
of vast numbers of inmates in jails, including a high percentage of unsen-
tenced inmates, materially decreases the amount of limited resources which
are available to those persons who are clearly the subject of this study--
namely the sencenced offender. It is the view of the Jail Task Force that
services to sentenced inmates could be substantially improved if efforts
were made to reduce the overall jail population.
It is suggested that jail populations could be drastically reduced
and services to sentenced inmates greatly improved if counties were to make
greater use of O.R. programs, citations, sentence modifications, county
parole, and work furlough. In addition, as stated previously, alcoholics
and other persons who do not pose a serious threat to the community, should
be removed from the jail population.
Recommendation
18. Counties should develop and expand programs aimed at minimizing
confinement in jails, such as O.R., use of citations, sentence modification,
county parole, and work furlough. They should also implement non-criminal
processing of alcoholics and other types of persons who do not pose a serious
threat to the community.
- 104 -
FOOTNOTES
i
Municipal Police Administration (Washington, 1969), p. 288.
2 President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of
Justice, The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society (Washington: U.S. Govern-
ment Printing Office, February, 1967), p. 178.
3 Board of Corrections, A Study of California County Jails, State of
California (Sacramento, April, 1970), p. 85.
4 Board of Corrections, The County Jails of California: An Evaluation,
State of California (Sacramento, June, 1957), p. 95.
⁵Board of Corrections, A Study of California County Jails, op. cit.,
p. 89.
⁶Interview with Mr. Ronald Beattie, Chief, Bureau of Criminal Statis-
tics.
⁷California Department of Justice, Criminal Justice Information System -
5 Year Implementation Plan (Sacramento, May, 1970), pp. 31 and 49-52.
⁸California Department of Justice, Adult Criminal Detention, Bureau
of Criminal Statistics, (Sacramento, 1970).
9M. Robert Montilla, "Opportunities for Action Research", Journal of
Research in Crime and Delinquency, Vol. VI (2), July, 1969, p. 127.
10 Board of Corrections, Report of The Committee to Study Inspection
of Local Detention Facilities, State of California (Sacramento, December, 1969).
11 Board of Corrections, Minimum Jail Standards, State of California
(Sacramento, November 1963; reissued June, 1969).
12 Board of Corrections, Report of the Committee to Study Inspection
of Local Detention Facilities, op. cit., p. 77.
13 Ibid., P. 172.
14 Ibid., pp. 79-82.
15 Ibid., P. 171.
16 Bureau of Criminal Statistics, Crime and Delinquency In California,
1969, State of California (Sacramento, 1970), p. 137.
17 California Committee on the Older Girl and the Law, Girls and Young
Women in Conflict With The Law In California, (Sacramento, December, 1958),
p. 8.
- 105 -
Footnotes
¹⁸Department of Corrections, "Master Plan For Womens Facilities
1966-1976", July, 1966 (Mimeographed).
19president's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of
Justice, Task Force Report: Corrections (Washington: U.S. Government
Printing Office, 1967), p. 73.
20 Ibid. F. 12.
21 Don Gottfredson, Systematic Study of Experience, Research Report #2,
Research Division, Department of Corrections, (Sacramento, December, 1961).
22 Daniel J. Freed and Patricia Wald, Bail In The United States: 1964,
United States Department of Justice (Washington, May, 1964), pp. 60-61.
23 President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of
Justice, Task Force Report: Corrections, op. cit., p. 64.
24 Royal Cak Municipal Court, Concerned Citizens and a City Criminal
Court, Project Misdemeanant Foundation (Royal Oak, 1969).
25 California Legislature, Report of Assembly Interim Committee on
County and City Jails, (Sacramento, 1948), p. 78.
26 Institute For The Study of Crime and Delinquency, The Model
Community Alcoholism Treatment Program, Model Community Correctional
Program, Appendix Report, (Sacramento, undated).
27 United States Department of Justice, The St. Louis Detoxification
and Diagnostic Evaluation Center, Law Enforcement Assistance Administration,
(Washington, 1970), pp. 65-66.
28Ibid.
29Ibid.
30 Royal Oak Municipal Court, op. cit.
31
President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of
Justice, Task Force Report: Corrections, op. cit., p. 104.
32 Ibid.
33 Board of Corrections, A Study of California County Jails, op. cit.,
p. 12.
ats 106 -
Footnotes
34
Institute For The Study of Crime and Delinquency, Youth Correc-
tional Centers, A New Approach To Treating Youthful Offenders, (Sacramento,
February, 1969).
35
Institute For The Study of Crime and Delinquency, Design For
Change - A Program For Correctional Management, (Sacramento, 1968).
36 President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of
Justice, Task Force Report: Corrections, op. cit., p. 93.
CORRECTIONAL SYSTEM STUDY
PRISON TASK FORCE REPORT
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS
vi
CHAPTER
I. INTRODUCTION
1
II. THE MULTIPLE GOALS OF PRISON OPERATION
3
The Goal of Deterrence
3
Incapacitation by Removal from the Community
5
The Goal of Rehabilitation
5
The limited impact of prison
5
Prison compared with the community
5
Characteristics of prison inmates
6
Lack of information on program effectiveness
6
Summary
6
Prison Treatment as the Totality of its Impact
7
III. CURRENT CONDITIONS AND RECOMMENDED IMPROVEMENTS
10
The Rehabilitation Services
10
Meeting the Incapacitation Goal
11
Reception and Classification
12
Reception
12
Composition of the prison population
13
Institutional programs and parole planning
14
Education and Training
14
Treatment Programs and Services
20
Counseling
20
Clinical services
23
Religion
25
CHAPTER
PAGE
Libraries
25
Recreation
25
Work Values and Correctional Industries
26
Work assignments
26
Industries
27
Custody, Security and Discipline
31
Principles of maintaining order
32
Prevention
32
Intervention
33
Discipline
33
Custody and security modifications
33
Inside gun towers and gun walks
33
Unreeded structures
34
Staffing patterns
34
Handling violent prisoners
34
Weapons control
35
Traffic and key control
35
Contraband weapon control
35
Counts
36
Emergency preparation and training
36
Disciplinary hearing and reports
36
Isolation, segregation and adjustment centers
37
Adjustment centers
38
Inmate Care Policies: Qualities of Prison Life
39
Clothing
40
Mail
40
[iii]
CHAPTER
PAGE
Living arrangements
41
Staff and inmate relationships
42
Supportive Services
43
Personnel and training
43
Medical services
44
Food service
45
Research and data processing
46
Statistics-data processing
47
Research
47
Administration and Organization
48
Physical Plant
50
Changes in plant use
50
Community-based institutions
52
Some Distinctive Problems
54
Reduction in the median term
55
IV. PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS FOR PRISONS
61
Prisor Management and the Team Approach
61
Inmate Incentives and Responsibilities
63
Prison and the Community
64
Release from Prison
66
Program Evaluation
66
V. A MODEL FOR PRISON OPERATIONS
70
Goals and Objectives
70
Functions
71
[iv]
LIST OF CHARTS
CHART
PAGE
I.
Institutions: Department of Corrections
53
[v]
SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS
The numerous specific recommendations of the Prison Task Force,
underlined throughout the text, are summarized here.
INSTITUTIONAL CLIMATE
1.
Insofar as possible, prisons should duplicate the demands and re-
sponsibilities of the free world, and should supply the motivations
as well as the responsibilities of the general community.
2.
Any future facility planning should emphasize efforts away from large
institutions, and current efforts at prison management should devote
more attention to the effect of large institutions upon the social
relations among various types of inmates, and the social distance
between inmates and staff.
RECEPTION AND CLASSIFICATION
3.
The reception process should be shortened from the current period of
six to eight weeks, to a period of approximately 30 days.
4.
The reception and diagnostic process should be shortened and revamped,
to include a systematic "follow-up", which would determine whether
or not the recommendations of the reception process are carried out.
Also, in the revamping of the reception process, there should be more
definite separation of young offenders from old, and the less crimi-
nally oriented from the more sophisticated.
5.
Efforts should be made throughout the system for a more differential
allocation of institutional population based on program need. A
careful typological analysis of the prison population and a thorough
review of classification practices and policies should be undertaken
in an effort to effect better institutional placement.
6.
Efforts should be taken to coordinate more closely institutional pro-
grams with parole planning.
EDUCATION
7.
The educational programs within the prisons should be strengthened,
in order to create a "climate for learning". In this respect, inmate
students should be paid a nominal sum comparable with prison industry
scales, at a rate contingent upon their individual progress in edu-
cation. Two or three hours of evening school should be available
for optional participation in every institution. The use of newer
educational techniques, methods and materials should be expanded. A
resource center should be established from which a wide variety of
Summary of Recommendations
instructional and informational materials could be distributed. Ed-
ucational television, including closed circuit television, should be
developed. The Department of Corrections should explore the use of
nearby schools and their resources for certain prisoners who can
safely be released to such schools. Vocational training equipment
and facilities should be improved. Job training values of prison
industrial and maintenance operations should be studied and exploited
by development of training programs or integration with present voca-
tional training. The vocational courses taught in each institution
should be reevaluated and there should be routine follow-up of pris-
oners who receive vocational training, with the data acquired during
the follow-up used in the guidance of the prison training programs.
Greater errollment in education programs should be encouraged.
TREATMENT PROGRAMS AND SERVICES
8.
Efforts should be made to make available ready access to counseling
and femiliarity with the counselor for those inmates anxious to have
such service.
9.
The counseling staff in each institution should be increased toward
the recommended American Correctional Association ratio of one coun-
selor for every 250 men.
10.
Less time should be devoted by counselors to the preparation of re-
ports for the Adult Authority. Consideration in this respect should
be given to the possible use of pre-coded "check-off" forms, such as
are presently used in the States of New York and Washington.
11.
Additional beds and staff should be made available for the psychiat-
ric program, and more realistic and competitive remuneration should
be made available to clinical personnel.
12.
Distinctive facilities for religious worship should be provided in
all institutions.
13.
Some institutions should be provided with better and greater library
space, and the number and quality of the books should be supplemented.
14.
Gymnasiums should be available in all institutions and a larger num-
ber of organized and supervised group recreational activities should
be developed.
INMATE WORK AND CORRECTIONAL INDUSTRIES
15.
The work furlough program should be expanded.
[vii]
Summary of Recommendations
16.
Each institution should undertake manpower utilization studies of
inmate work forces.
17.
The innate wage scale should be revised upward.
18.
Additional markets should be sought for California's prison indus-
tries program.
19.
ALL expansion of prison industries to new markets should be concen-
trated in industries which need operations and skills similar to
those required in free world employment.
20.
The Correctional Industries Commission should be renomed the Correc-
tional Industries and Training Commission and its membership should
be expanded to include two experts in the field of vocational train-
ing, the Chancellor of the California Community Colleges, and the
California Superintendent of Public Instruction, or their designees.
21.
The Department of Corrections administration should indicate full
support for prison industries, and should more closely integrate
industrial operations with the total institutional programs. More
involvement of industry's personnel is needed in each institution,
especially in major decision-making committees. Training programs
should include industrial and non-industrial personnel. ALL indus-
trial and other personnel must agree that assignment to industries
should be made primarily on a basis of inmate needs, and inmates
assigned to industry should be expected to work approximately eight
hours a day at a good pace. Training consideration should be given
greater priority by prison industries.
CUSTODY, SECURITY AND DISCIPLINE
22.
In certain institutions, consideration should be given to the use of
"closed circuit" television scanning as a means of maintaining sur-
veillance, in which case some gun towers within the compound could
be eliminated or manned only in emergencies. Consideration should
also be given to the razing of some unneeded structures which now
appear to impair vision of staff.
23.
Consideravion should be given to the possible reallocation of staff
and redesignation of shifts to provide greater staffing during crit-
ical daytime hours.
24.
In those instances where chemical agents must be used to restore
order, consideration should be given to the use of mace instead of
gas.
25.
In those instances where an institution's arsenal is sub-standard,
it should be modernized.
[viii]
Summary of Recommendations
26.
In those institutions which have archaic sally ports, electrically
operated gates should be provided. Also, new cell-locking systems
should be installed to replace those systems which are now obsolete,
and innates should be removed from any gate assignment which involves
them in security-sensitive positions.
27.
The method of taking count in California prisons should be updated
and the "total count" method should be discontinued.
28.
Riot control plans at all institutions should he reviewed and re-
hearsed.
29.
Insofcr as possible, inmate rule violations should be handled by the
line officer and supervisor. If the matter is serious enough for
referral to the disciplinary committee, the committee should still
have the authority after hearing the case, to withhold the report
from the offender's official prison record. Whatever the disposition,
the inmate should be advised.
30.
The maximum time for which an institution can assign isolation should
be reduced to ten days. Any period of inmate isolation beyond ten
days should require the Director's approval.
31.
In respect to adjustment center programs, the Director should issue
a new policy statement, giving renewed emphasis to the importance of
developing and using alternatives to long-term lock-ups. The Depart-
ment should initiate a special, intensive orientation and training
programfor all personnel regarding this issue. The wardens and
superintendents should screen the cases of all men housed in adjust-
ment centers to determine if any alternative placement is possible.
The Director's office should review the recommendations. Initial
placement in the adjustment centers should not be made without the
approval of the warden or the superintendent. The Institutional
Disciplinary Committee should submit a factual report to the warden
with corroborated evidence where possible, and rationale for the
recommended action. Inmates should have the right to a hearing be-
fore the committee within three days of the report. Staff represen-
tation on behalf of the inmate should be tried. Every 30 days the
Disciplinary Committee should review each adjustment center case,
at which time the inmate should appear before the Committee. When
an inmate is detained beyond 30 days, the Director's office should
be advised and the case should be reviewed in the central office.
The Disciplinary Committee should have the authority to release men
from the adjustment center at any time. In the interest of effi-
ciency, the size of the committee should be reduced to three per-
sons with the program administrator acting as a member of the com-
mittee. The original concept of the adjustment center should be
restored by increasing treatment efforts in all of these facilities.
Adjustment centers should be closed if the number of men housed in
them is reduced. It is conceivable that some of the units could be
used for regular housing, after a thorough physical revamping.
[ix]
Summary of Recommendations
INMATE CARE
32.
Prison clothing regulations should be liberalized to permit inmates
to wear civilian clothes.
33.
Full and complete censorship of mail should be abandoned in favor of
spot-type censorship, or some other modified form of censorship.
34.
California Department of Corrections' generally liberal visiting
arrangements and schedules should be extended to all institutions.
35.
Family or conjugal visiting, now offered in some institutions, should
be expanded to all institutions.
36.
Telephore arrangements which permit collect calls to family and friends
should be installed in more of the housing units in selected institu-
tions.
37.
The Department of Corrections should move firmly in the direction of
eliminating all double cells.
38.
The Department should consider a systematic program to enhance the
esthetics of the institutions.
39.
Cooperative and collaborative relationships between staff and inmates
shoula be developed as much as possible whenever this is at all com-
patible with other prison functions.
SUPPORTIVE SERVICES
40.
The central office should play a more prominent role in determining
who is to be trained and what the content of the training courses
should be, and also to insure that they are adequate at all institu-
tions. More training should be developed for other than custodial
personnel. Ideally, there should be State coordinated correctional
training centers established to provide year-around comprehensive
programs to train all correctional workers and administrators.
41.
Responsibility for recruitment of minority persons should be fixed
in one person at every institution.
42.
The Department should consolidate its hospital services. A plan
should be developed to replace some of the hospitals with dispensaries
so that when geographically feasible, some hospitals can serve several
institutions.
43.
When possible, community hospitals should be used in emergencies or
as the need arises.
[x]
Summary of Recommendations
44.
The Department should utilize funds from the Department of Vocational
Rehabilitation to improve the quality of medical services, especially
in the area of prosthetics, correctional surgery, and diagnostic
evaluation.
45.
The Department's existing "unit records" type system should be re-
placed with the computerized information system which emphasizes pro-
gram type data for management purposes. Such a system should be de-
signed to include follow-up data along with current data on programs
and offenders, so that separate programs may be evaluated as to their
relative effectiveness for different types of offenders in the long-
run. Cost effectiveness estimates of the long-run economic conse-
quences of specific programs for different types of offenders should
also be undertaken.
46.
Some funds should be devoted to experimental pilot programs; the pos-
sibility of Federal monies for this kind of effort should be explored.
ADMINISTRATION AND ORGANIZATION
47.
More specific and definite department-wide standards need to be im-
plemented in certain areas. Policy statements should be reviewed and
written in a clear and concise manner to eliminate ambiguities.
48.
Within the Department, the lines and responsibilities of administra-
tion should be simplified.
PHYSICAL PLANT
49.
The California Men's Colony, West Facility, should never be reoccupied.
50.
San Quentin Prison and Folsom Prison should be abandoned.
51.
In the event California builds more State institutions, these should
as far as possible be small, community-based facilities (e.g. community
correctional centers). The Department should also explore further
contractual arrangements with private persons and social agencies,
such as the Y.M.C.A. and the Volunteers of America.
LENGTH OF CONFINEMENT
52.
The State should reduce the length of terms served by persons committed
to the Department of Corrections.
[xi]
=
Prisons in America have done far better
at postponing crime than at preventing or
deterring it."
Newsweek Magazine
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
The last recourse of any correctional system, other than the death
penalty, is imprisonment. California today has more prisoners than any
other state, reflecting the fact that in most of the past half-century it
has been a leader among the states in both population growth and crime
rates. Presumably its high crime rate is a product of this population
growth, for mixed with its stable and law-abiding newcomers has been an
above average proportion of delinquents, criminals and others unsuccessful
in older communities who sought "greener pastures" here. The newness of
many California neighborhoods has also been criminogenic, for they are
clusterings of strangers, with more anonymity and less informal social
control than characterize long-settled communities of stable population,
such as those of non-metropolitan New England.
California's penal system has not only had a rapid development for
several decades. it has also had a national and international reputation
for program innovation. Nevertheless, this State's prisons, like those
everywhere else, have repeatedly frustrated and disappointed both their
administrators and the general public.
Information for this study, to evaluate California's prisons and
recommend changes, came from a number of sources. Most important were site
visits made to all major institutions of the Department. In these visits
approximately equal time kds devoted to interviews of assembled staff and
to inspections of the facilities. In the group interviews a cross section
of virtually every staff component was included. On the inspection tours
employees enccuntered in each area were interviewed individually concerning
the practices and programs at their respective institutions. The group
discussions were characteristically open and informative. In each dis-
cussion some sixteen program and problem areas were routinely covered, and
staff were asked to volunteer their own perceptions of additional problems
and priorities.
After the visits, written questionnaires were sent to each institu-
tion to elicit more formally quantified data on program enrollments, custody
levels, lengths of stay, staff training programs, and other areas where it
was considered important to verify interview data, obtain more current status
information, or get exact counts in verification of published data.
An additional segment of the study involved interview of some randomly-
selected 325 inmates to obtain their views of the problems and needs of the
system. The views of ex-offenders were also solicited.
- 2 -
Interviews were conducted with central office personnel to obtain
top administrators' views of priorities and long range plans, as well as
to secure information on central office administrative functions.
Finally, a review of the current literature on the California De-
partment of Corrections was made. This included departmental publications
and research as well as legislative research and some criticisms of the
Department disseminated by outside groups.
Data from all of these diverse sources are presented where they are
relevant to a particular prison management topic, instead of being collated
separately by source. The rationale for recommendations is presented, in-
cluding all available sources of insight, rather than relying on any single
source of data-questionnaires, for example--which would be procedurally
neater. While recommendations reached in this way are in part judgmental,
the most plausible inferences from available evidence must be relied upon,
whenever there is no indisputable scientific data on an issue.
In summary, this Report endeavors to list the objectives of a sound
prison system, to explain how California attempts to meet these objectives,
and how, finally, these objectives could be better accomplished. Specific
recommendations are underlined throughout the text.
CHAPTER II
THE MULTIPLE GOALS OF PRISON OPERATION
All components of criminal justice, including corrections, have one
ultimate mission: to reduce crime. The prisons component is expected to
contribute to this aim by pursuing three goals: (1) deterrence of the po-
tential offender; (2) incapacitation of the dangerous individual by remov-
ing him from the community; (3) reformation of this individual prior to his
release. A fourth function often demanded is satisfaction of the public's
passion for revenge. Though pressures for retribution often cannot be ig-
nored, satisfying public indignation does not contribute to crime reduction.
The first three goals, therefore, are the concern, with the fourth viewed
as an occasionally unavoidable constraint in pursuit of the first three.
Society places two additional constraints on the pursuit of these goals
which cannot be ignored: prisons must be operated economically and humanely.
All penal policies should be examined in terms of their consequences
for these goals and constraints, but it must be recognized that there may
be conflicts among these objectives and restrictions. Often one concern
cannot be met without jeopardizing others. Each goal must be recognized
but none overemphasized at the expense of the others. A few comments on
general issues and major problems surrounding the achievement of prison
goals will serve as a background for later recommendations.
I. THE GOAL OF DETERRENCE
Deterrence is often said to be a goal of imprisonment. It may be
divided into general deterrence, to keep all those who contemplate commit-
ting a crime from trying it, and individual deterrence, to keep a person
who has committed a crime and been caught from doing it again. While prison
doubtless deters some potential offenders, general deterrence is difficult
to measure. Estimates of the general deterrence potential of prisons are
unreliable and doubtlessly exaggerated.
Since not many of the felonies committed result in the perpetrators
going to prison, it is a wonder that some persons have great faith in accom-
plishing general deterrence by long prison terms. Legislation has been in-
troduced in California and elsewhere, some of which has been passed, to
deal with various outrages by long mandatory prison sentences. Experience
everywhere has shown that unusually long sentences do not reduce the crime
rate, and in fact might result in its increase. While there is no question
that prisons have some general deterrent value, it is also obvious that if
a man believes he will be sent to prison for an act, he will usually either:
(1) not commit the act, regardless of whether he expects his time in prison
to be one or two years or ten or twenty, or (2) be so out of control that
he will commit it regardless. Both of these circumstances are common. A
robbery usually occurs because the offender believes that he will not be
caught, much less sent to prison. Clearly, the length of the sentence he
does not expect to serve is no deterrent. Most murders are committed in
a rage against close friends, spouses or other kin; the murderer makes no
- 4 -
attempt to flee and has clearly not considered the punishment which may re-
sult from his crime.
The use of long prison terms to decrease crimes by deterrence of other
people is clearly unrealistic. It is implicitly based on a model which pre-
sumes that the offender balances how long he will be in prison against the
expected rewards of his crime. This model is a fantasy. If a potential
offender thinks about the prospect of imprisonment, it is usually of the
risk of any appreciable term; he considers the probability of imprisonment
much more than its duration.
It is not suggested here that prisons have no general deterrent value.
Penalties do deter up to some optimum point of severity for general deter-
rence purposes, for the particular offense and type of potential offender.
If no one ever went to prison or jail and even the most serious offenses
resulted only in fines or in probation, it would doubtless encourage a small
minority of the general population to engage in crime that they would other-
wise not contemplate if penalties were more severe. The point stressed here
is that there is no reason whatever to expect long prison sentences to be
more effective than moderate ones in deterring most people from trying crime.
If the fact of imprisonment is reasonably certain, a one or two year sentence
will be sufficient to deter nearly everyone from almost any unlawful act that
is deliberately conceived. Prison sentences, no matter how long, are inef-
fective for acts perpertrated in such passion that there is little deliber-
ation about their consequences. If the very long sentences found in Calif-
ornia are to be justified, they must be justified on grounds other than
general deterrence.
Individual deterrence, the released prisoner's avoidance of crime
from fear of reimprisonment, differs from general deterrence and is espe-
cially difficult to measure. Investigation suggests that individual de-
terrence varies greatly among prisoners, depending upon their adaptation
to incarceration and their preoccupation with the outside world. While
almost all prisoners want to get out, some are highly involved in their
daily pursuits within the institution, have little contact with persons on
the outside, and do not seem to think much about the outside. Others are
absorbed in thoughts of their outside world and are always "doing hard
time". Those deterred work hardest at trying to get out early by partic-
ipating in rehabilitation programs in order to impress the parole board
favorably, whether or not they have other interests in these programs.
One cannot know how much of inmates' post-release avoidance of crime is
due to deterrence and how much is the result of rehabilitation programs.
On the other hand, dreams of success at crime may also motivate a few pris-
oners in the avid pursuit of rehabilitation activities in order to impress
parole authorities favorably. Therefore, inmate recidivism occurs in spite
of apparent rehabilitation and presumed deterrence by imprisonment. Society
is left with incapacitation as the one goal of imprisonment for which attain-
ment is unambiguously measureable.
- 5
II. INCAPACITATION BY REMOVAL FROM THE COMMUNITY
The second goal listed for prisons was the incapacitation of danger-
ous individuals by removing them from their potential victims. Some men
commit serious crimes and remain dangerous for a long time, as efforts fail
to change them. This category includes both persistently violent men and
highly professional property offenders. For some people of this sort, pri-
sons are the only answer available, and for a few, a long term may be appro-
priate for the purpose of incapacitating them. It should be noted, however,
that it is expensive to confine very many for very long, and few require it.
Much of the cost of the California prison system results from its use of un-
usually long sentences. If rehabilitation were accelerated, incapacitation
could be briefer, and if rehabilitation is impeded by some forms of incapaci-
tation, perhaps alteration of these forms will be desirable. That will be
a later concern of this discussion.
III. THE GOAL OF REHABILITATION
There has been much criticism of prison systems in California and
elsewhere for alleged failure to rehabilitate. While improvements in this
area are needed, it is important to recognize intrinsic difficulties sur-
rounding the entire rehabilitative enterprise in prison. Four of these
constraints are discussed in this section.
The Limited Impact of Prison
The prison system has a limited scope of impact. There are limits
to the extent that it can affect the outside community where the offender's
problems are generated, and to which he must return. In prisons one fre-
quently observes great improvement in the behavior traits presumed to have
been the cause of an inmate's crime--such as low interest or capacity in
work, or emotional instability--only to see these traits recur during parole
in the community. Both recidivism and rehabilitation are functions of social
influences not operating exclusively in prison. It is comfortable to fault
the prisons for recidivism rates, but to do so may show a failure to under-
stand the problem fully.
Prison Compared with the Community
Prisons, especially as large as those found in California, make de-
mands upon behavior different from those made in the community. The envi-
ronment, the pace, the sources of social status and of self-satisfaction,
are different from those on the outside. It is difficult to find enough
work to keep prisoners busy. Many learn how not to work rather than how to
work, and they do not participate sufficiently in the decision-making on
matters which directly affect their lives. There are almost irrestible
pressures to conform to the inmate value systems, and institutional necessi-
- 6 -
ties force other conformities. While these forces cannot readily be elimi-
nated, they can be ameliorated and sometimes made supportive of rehabilita-
tion, rather than opposed to it. Nevertheless, the best place to prepare
a man for responsible community life is in the community. It is a mistake
to bring him to prison if that can be avoided. If he must be imprisoned,
it is appropriate--even in prison--to maximize his contacts with those as-
pects of outside community life which will contribute to his rehabilitation.
Characteristics of Prison Inmates
The men coming into prisons have deep and ingrained problems which
resist change. It is widely claimed that those now sent to prison present
worse problems for rehabilitation than those sent there formerly, because
the better risks are increasingly given probation and not sent to prison.
A look into the files of any California prison reveals that almost all who
are committed there have records of extensive prior criminal involvement.
These are mostly persons about whom there was despair while they were still
in grade school, and continually thereafter. It is unrealistic to expect
wholesale reformation of those who pursued crime so early and for so long
a time. To say that forty percent or fifty percent or any percent is a
high failure rate with such a population is pointless. High compared to
what? No one can say what is a "good" recidivism rate. Some prison systems
around the country report better success rates than California's, but many
of their successes are with men who should not have been in prison in the
first place, and would not have been in prison in California. Furthermore,
according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports, California has the highest
rate of serious crime of any of the fifty states. Recidivism, therefore,
must be reduced in a highly criminogenic community population. The assess-
ment of California's prison system with respect to its recidivism rates
must be made on the basis of what the system is doing with its cases. In-
ternal statistical comparisons can be meaningful, but system-wide, overall
rates should not be used pejoratively.
Lack of Information on Program Effectiveness
The behavioral sciences have not presented the prison administrator
with any array of rehabilitative techniques that is consistently effective.
Ideally, correction must always be a research enterprise, operated so that
knowledge is gained from its experience. A major concern of this system
study, therefore, is to increase the ability of prison management to learn
quickly and validly from its failures as well as from its successes.
Summary
These difficulties are listed in order to put the problem of rehabil-
itation in California prisons in proper perspective. Discussions of reha-
bilitation often overlook these considerations and are therefore naive.
The public tends to assume that progressive prison programs with their on-
ward and upward cast do, in fact, move all men onward and upward and that
all is well; or else it looks a little closer and discovers that all is not
- 7 -
well and it rejects the whole enterprise. If people can be brought to see
the difficulties of the task realistically, they might settle for modest
gains and be more supportive of attempts at improvement.
California has done an excellent job over the years in correcting
the public image of prison goals as purely punitive. The emphasis of its
public information efforts has appropriately been placed on rehabilitation.
The importance of rehabilitative effort can hardly be overemphasized. How-
ever, the result has also been to oversell everyone--including correctional
professionals--on the real or perceived rehabilitative efficacy of prisons.
It is time tc correct that impression. It is not clear, rehabilitatively
speaking, whether prison operations are an overall gain or a loss. Those
who claim to know the answer never give impressive evidence. Anyone with
correctional experience is convinced that he personally knows men who were
reached by prison programs. He has seen the free world dropout catch fire
in the prison school, finish high school inside, and go on to finish college
outside. And he has seen the man with a long criminal record and no appar-
ent motivation to change get caught up in a trade course and become a journey-
man and a solid citizen on the outside. Some of these successes might not
have happened without the prison programs. But in more cases, no observable
change occurs, or inmates leave prison less suited for society than when
they came in. That is why it is not clear whether prisons have, on balance,
a net rehabilitative effect.
From these facts some observers conclude (and this thinking appar-
ently lies behind some of the reports to the California Legislature) that
prisons should virtually be eliminated. A more realistic conclusion would
appear to be that while their use should be minimized, prisons cannot be
abolished. Whatever the overall rehabilitative effect, there are many men
who pursue crime until they are arrested; nothing encourages repetition of
an offense as does success in benefitting from it and not being caught.
Often they do not require long confinement. But whenever a period of in-
capacitation is warranted, everything possible should be done to foster
rehabilitation during confinement, as well as afterwards. To make this
effort is a social responsibility. An appropriate analogy would be to med-
icine's concern with each individual patient, rather than business' concern
with overall or aggregate success or failure rates. A business is a failure
if it loses one dollar more than it earns, but men succeed or fail separate-
ly, and there is no aggregate break-even point in helping them. If nine of
ten succeed, society has still lost one; if nine of ten fail, the one who
succeeded because of the system's effort has no less value.
IV. PRISON TREATMENT AS THE TOTALITY OF ITS IMPACT
When staff members of California prisons are asked what the major
rehabilitative features of their institutions are, they respond with a cat-
alogue of specific treatment programs, such as academic education, job train-
ing, and counseling. This is a predictable response because these programs
are labeled "rehabilitative". There is a natural tendency to feel that to
the extent that an institution has such programs, it is mounting a meaningful
- 8 -
rehabilitative effort, and to the extent that it lacks them, it is not. But
one should not be misled by such labels and categories.
Admittedly, for purposes of administration, the system must divide its
operations into parts. While some parts carry the treatment label and some
do not, to the inmate imprisonment is all one epoch in his life. If what
happens to him ultimately is a consequence of prison programs, it reflects
the net effects of all attentions given him and and all failures of atten-
tion during his confinement. The system may reach a man in the counseling
group and lose him in the yard; elevate him in the school and crush him in
the block. The system may reach him in the block, too, as research has
shown. All prison experiences either add up, or fail to result in rehabil-
itation. Thus, all practices should be examined for their impact on reha-
bilitation, and not just programs specifically labeled "treatment". This
is particularly true in California where excellent programs are sometimes
established under circumstances almost certain to subvert their positive
effects. Reference is made especially to the physical situations in which
men are placed, and to the matter of excessive sentence lengths. If pro-
grams labeled "rehabilitative" have not worked in the past, it may be be-
cause their effects were nullified by these conditions.
In California, as elsewhere, educational programs are the mainstay
of treatment programming for most inmates. Most men coming into California
prisons have significant deficiencies in employment skills and in school
performance, so the efforts to instruct them have real justification. Yet
it is becoming increasingly apparent that programs aimed solely at improving
abilities, such as job training and academic instruction, will not guarantee
the inmate's use of these abilities to achieve a law-abiding life outside
the prison. To an extent which varies tremendously with different offenders
rehabilitation may require the diminution of attraction to crime as a source
of income, the development of confidence in ability to succeed at legitimate
occupational pursuits, the growth of ease and enjoyment in previously un-
familiar or unconfortable types of social situations, or the control of hos-
tile passions or of alcoholic, narcotic, or sexual appetites. All of these
problems for correctional concern, and educational or vocational deficien-
cies, are distributed somewhat independently of each other in the diverse
population with which the prison must work.
If attempts to correct the causes of recidivism are to succeed, two
conditions are needed which are notably lacking in contemporary penal in-
stitutions:
1. So far as possible, prisons must duplicate the demands and re-
sponsibilities of the free world, and supply the motivations as
well as the responsibilities of the general community.
2. It IS essential for staff to get to know the man. Large insti-
tutions are unable to achieve this. Any future planning of
facilities should give more serious attention to the question
of size. Current efforts at prison management should have a
clearer understanding than heretofore, of its effects on the
social relations among various types of inmate, and the social
distance between inmates and staff.
- 9 -
Ultimately it is the way inmates are treated--no more, no less than
that--which is most important. It is useless to put people in a particular
program which is meant to reform them if they are not treated as worthwhile
humans in general. For convenience of uniformity, for administrative sim-
plicity, for a host of dubious advantages, the whole effort can become a
sham. To the inmate this amounts to hypocrisy implemented. It must fail.
But what does "the way people are treated" mean? Primarily it means that
the system must treat men as worthwhile individuals wherever possible.
This seems a truism-that people be treated with personal interest in them
as humans--but some prison practices militate against this and these prac-
tices could be eliminated. Of course, an institution cannot operate com-
pletely differently for each man. Many inmates make neurotic and unreason-
able demands, and some standardization can be justified for fairness and
efficiency. But wherever possible, individuality should be allowed. Uni-
formity is sometimes a necessity; it should never be made an ideal.
Further, if a system exists where institutional housing is not fit
for humans, where the weak cannot be protected, and where the duration of
confinement is too long, then it cannot change men. If society is to change
those whom it confines, the prisons must simultaneously make more or better
demands on their inmates and give them more incentives to meet these demands
than has ever been done in the past. First of all, however, it must be as-
certained that society has an adequate moral and ethical stance from which
to make these demands. This cannot exist until the system treats people
as it should in all respects.
The above points are intended to establish a more realistic picture
of prospects and problems in achieving rehabilitation. If it is accepted
that, despite its difficulties, the job must be attempted, it is time to
turn to some of the more specific issues which are involved in getting the
job done more successfully in California.
CHAPTER III
CURRENT CONDITIONS AND RECOMMENDED IMPROVEMENTS
The Department of Corrections has published excellent summary de-
scriptions of its institutions and their operations. There is little to
be gained by reporting them here. This chapter will discuss only those
features which seem most relevant to enhancing achievement of correctional
goals.
The administrative and operative structure of the Department is not
neatly divided according to its goals, as it is not desirable to have one
set of staff whose sole responsibility is rehabilitation, for example, and
another whose only concern is keeping people confined. Such a separation,
where practiced, has usually resulted in friction among staff and in fail-
ure to meet the goals. The responsibilities for achievement of all prison
purposes needs to be shared to a considerable extent by all staff, although
emphasis on different goals will vary from one part of the prison organiza-
tion to another.
Of the three major goals named earlier, deterrence may be excluded
here. Prisons deter by their existence, not by their techniques. No staff
or operations are assigned to this function.
The two remaining goals have at least rough structural counterparts.
The institutions have separate treatment and custody staffs with respective
major responsibilities in rehabilitative programming and in keeping danger-
ous men incapacitated. In practice, these staffs have other functions as
well, but these are the two primary functions to be discussed here.
I. THE REHABILITATION SERVICES
To achieve the rehabilitative function of prisons, California has
relied mainly on what may be called traditional correctional treatment pro-
grams (which still do not exist in many state systems). These are: voca-
tional education, academic education, counseling, religious instruction,
self-help organizations, psychiatric treatment and work activities. These
are the mainstays of what is commonly regarded as the rehabilitative effort,
although other programs--such as recreation, medical services, and hobby
activities--may also have some rehabilitative value and are important for
other reasons.
These programs are present to some extent everywhere in the system.
All major institutions and many camps have some trade training, some acade-
mic schooling, and some group counseling. Psychiatric care is not so ex-
tensively available, primarily because of the cost, the difficulty in
securing psychiatrists, and because a majority of inmates do not need
psychiatric artention. The mixture of programs varies. Walled prisons
place less emphasis on treatment-designated programs than do other large
institutions, and the facilities for young inmates provide greater access
to trade training than is available at those housing older inmates. But
- 11 -
in many respects the difference among institutions is one of rather small
degree. Some programs could be developed more adequately if more concen-
trated in specialized institutions, instead of being distributed almost
equally to all facilities. The number of institutions in the California
system allows for such specialization in considerably greater degree than
is practiced at present.
The above are the treatment programs in which most inmates may be-
come involved. The major ones will be discussed in detail later in this
chapter. Emotionally disturbed inmates, those with medical needs, narcotic
addicts, and other special problem cases receive other forms of treatment
of varying degrees of adequacy, for their particular problems. Not all
those needing psychiatric care can be accommodated in the facilities pre-
sently devoted to that purpose, however, and even with the large number
of academic and vocational classes, the majority of inmates needing and
desiring these programs at any given time are not receiving them inten-
sively. Most have work assignments which make only limited demands, with
little challenge and regard for good performance. In some cases, idleness
continues to exist. Many who have completed a trade course, and who are
not interested in further academic work, perform routine and unskilled
work for the balance of a three or four year term. It is, in fact, diffi-
cult to see how they could otherwise occupy their time. This is not
primarily a problem of lack of treatment programs, but simply that the
rehabilitative enterprise neither needs nor can use all the time it has
to fill for many cases in California.
II. MEETING THE INCAPACITATION GOAL
The responsibility for keeping those inmates judged to be dangerous
to the community from escaping--one of the major functions of prisons--is
centered in the custody staff. Yet this is not the major responsibility
of most of these employees in terms of time or effort. Perimeter security
is not especially difficult to maintain for most inmates. The effort ex-
pended by custody is primarily aimed at the maintenance of internal order
and safety. These conditions really contribute more to the rehabilitative
goal than to security of the outside community, since safety and order are
preconditions for rehabilitation, as well as serving humanitarian require-
ments.
So far as specific measures dealing with the incapacitation goal are
concerned, the system has five broad levels of security ranging from "maxi-
mum" to "camps", there are also subdivisions within these categories. The
distribution of felons among the major levels (as of June 30, 1970) was as
follows:
Maximum
1.3%
Close
2.4%
Medium
55.9%
Minimum
29.1%
Camps
11.3%
100.0%
- 12 -
Most escapes are from minimum or lower custody levels. While the
escape rate for the system as a whole is not high compared with the rate
in some other states--less than one per hundred in residence per year--the
rate from camps and more especially from community centers, work furlough
and weekend furlough settings runs high. For these, the escape rate is
from five to twenty times the average for the system, or higher than for
similar settings in other jurisdictions. It is not clear why this should
be, but two conjectures may be offered. The long sentences may lead to a
kind of accumulated deprivation which seeks release at the first opportunity
(especially for those who do not have an out date from the Adult Authority);
or, it may be that qualifications for camp placement are not primarily fac-
tors relating to escapes, so that the best risks are not placed in camps.
But this is purely speculative and beyond the scope of the present report.
In general, the goal of isolation of offenders from the community seems to
be accomplished by present measures. While there are a fair number of
walkaways, they are from settings not made available to the most dangerous
types, the walkaways have not contributed measurably to the State's crime
problem.
III. RECEPTION AND CLASSIFICATION
Initial classification consists of diagnosis and subsequent place-
ment recommendation. Though not a treatment process itself, classifica-
tion is essential to the effective application of treatment, since it
attempts to determine which programs are needed by each person. It also
gives an indication of the degree of custody required for each person, and
this has bearing on the available treatment options.
Classification procedures must be as discriminating and sensitive
as treatment and custodial programs are diversified. The California system
has a relatively wide range of programs. For this reason, accurate diagno-
sis is essential to insure that programs are efficiently used.
Classification procedures should not defer entirely to the available
options. Classification recommendations which cannot be followed reveal
types of additional correctional programs which are needed, and are thus
valuable indicators for progress and change.
Reception
The reception process should be shortened. When the courts commit
a person to a penal institution, he is first sent to a reception center or
housed in the receiving unit of a prison for a short period of time. In
California this runs from six to eight weeks, which is more time than is
actually needed. All tests and examinations can be completed in a thirty-
day period or less for a new inmate, and still less for a returned recidi-
vist on whom frequently there is ample recent information on file. Upon
completion of the initial classification study, transportation problems are
often encountered. Every effort should be made to solve these problems by
- 13 -
a regular schedule of adequate interprison busses, properly guarded. At
the women's institution there is no sound reason why the new admissions
cannot be transferred to the adjacent main institution after a brief re-
ception period, even though the evaluation is incomplete. The women will
go only to this one institution. From the fifth week on, there is virtu-
ally nothing of a constructive nature to occupy the new admissions in the
reception centers and it is especially important to start them on their
institutional programs.
The whole reception and diagnostic process in California prisons
needs shortening and reworking. In many Federal prisons an Intake Screen-
ing officer often recommends a full program for a new inmate within a few
days of his reception. Some follow-up study then occurs soon after the
inmate is on initial assignment, where he can be observed in situations
more comparable to his future institutional stay than is his life in the
reception center. Delaying assignment pending in-depth study occurs in
some cases, but only where unusual need for it is indicated by the Intake
Screening officer.
The recommendations of the reception-guidance center should be fol-
lowed up systematically to see if they are carried out, and if not, why not.
At present, no routine check is made to determine what happens to the pro-
gram recommendations of the reception-guidance staff. Regular determina-
tions of how the guidance center's recommendations are actually carried
out should reveal deficiencies in the staff reports, in the institutions,
or both. The recommendations sometimes appear to be made without full
knowledge of the programs available. Assignment to a particular prison
often seems to be made more on the basis of institutional job needs and
vacancies than on inmate need. This is partly justified in the institu-
tions by the fact that recommendations from the reception-guidance center
are often sketchy, specifying little more than custody level. In some
cases there is no clear connection made between the social-psychological
data obtained by tests and interviews and the recommendation, if any, for
treatment. This limits the usefulness of the reception center reports to
the receiving institutions. In the reception centers, there should also
be a more definite separation of young from old, the less criminally orient-
ed from the sophisticated.
Composition of the Prison Population
Whether there should be a more or a less homogeneous population in a
penal institution, aside from reception centers, is often a complex question,
on which experts may reasonably disagree. The fundamental law of sociology
and social anthropology is that social separation produces cultural differ-
entiation. This means that people in separated groups become homogeneous
in cultural traits, and different from people elsewhere. That law ex-
plains not only why there exist separate languages and cultural beliefs in
the world, but also why young offenders, addicts and other prisoners of
similar background tend to preserve and accentuate their shared deviant
beliefs when grouped together in an institution. It is also repeatedly
demonstrated that to group inmate troublemakers within a prison is to ask
- 14 -
for continual trouble from them. If possible, they should be dispersed so
that each could be more readily controlled by being absorbed into a diverse
group and by being placed in a program of maximum individual appeal.
Change in inmates' character, often rehabilitative but sometimes
anti-rehabilitative, is most probable when they have close involvement and
identification with persons of different background and even of different
age from themselves. Conversely, reinforcement in their past types of crim-
inal orientation is most probable when their grouping is only with persons
of the same criminal background, age and area. Anti-rehabilitative impacts
of some inmates on others can be noted and dealt with most readily by staff
counseling when the worst inmates are scattered. Programs can often be most
adequately staffed and equipped--whether for vocational training, education,
psychiatric or other services--if inmates who need those programs, even if
there is much diversity in their characteristics, are concentrated in one
institution. Inmates there may then share constructive interests in the
program. California prisons are relatively unspecialized, although their
large number permits considerable specialization in programs.
Therefore, a greater effort to establish more differential alloca-
tion of institutional population based on program need throughout the entire
system is indicated, and a careful typological analysis of the prison pop-
ulation and a thorough review of classification practices and policies could
result in better institutional placement.
Institutional Programs and Parole Planning
Institutional programs should be more closely coordinated with parole
planning. Ideally, parole planning should begin at the time of admission,
i.e., in the reception center. This is not always possible but it is desir-
able. Too often no planning is initiated until a few days before the pris-
oner's release. This kind of hasty planning will inevitably have short-
comings.
Once a relevant, solid institutional program has been set up for an
inmate, periodic reviews should be made to determine if the program continues
to be pertinent to the man's community plans.
The earlier the field agent can become acquainted with the prisoner,
his family and community situations, the better should be the results.
Based on the agent's findings, it would sometimes be in order to change
or modify the prisoner's institutional program. Direct involvement of the
field staff would be helpful in another way. Feed-back from the field per-
sonnel should aid the institution in the improvement of its programs.
IV. EDUCATION AND TRAINING
It is almost a truism that today education is indispensable. With-
out it, a man may be virtually unemployable. With adequate training in an
- 15 -
acceptable skill, his employment opportunity, at least in periods of full
employment, has often been almost assured. While some persons without
training who have good work attitudes and motivation will be employed, and
often will be trained by employers (especially during periods of prosperity),
it is still valid to assert that a trained person usually finds it easier
to obtain a decent, well-paying job than an untrained one. Work skills
aside, general academic education is a near necessity in meeting the com-
plexities of daily life. Add to these facts the observation that a large
percentage of men coming into prison are school dropouts, severely defi-
cient in both specific and general training, and the importance of prison
education programs becomes abundantly evident. Since prison provides ample
time to be filled and a minimum of distractions, it should offer prisoners
a maximum opportunity for educational advancement. For many inmates educa-
tion also provides a satisfying and wholesome diversion.
Yet, despite the strong case which can be made for it, there is much
to suggest that correctional education as presently constituted, has often
been rather unsuccessful. The evidence grows that education for prisoners
should be custom-tailored to their diverse needs, and that too much re-
liance has been placed in prison on a traditional educational approach
designed for youth. What works in public schools in the community does
not necessarily work in prison for adults of diverse educational back-
grounds and with school a predominantly distant and unhappy experience.
Basic to success in correctional education are: (1) information
about the inmate pupils and their individual potentials; (2) an awareness
of the society from which the prisoner comes and the society to which he
is going; (3) individualized instructional material; (4) incentives to
educational achievement; and above all, (5) a "climate for learning".
The climate to which reference is made is not merely that of the class-
rooms--it should be an attribute of the entire prison. An institution
director and staff at all levels who encourage learning are not just ad-
ventitious products of recruitment; they must be assiduously developed.
Such an institution climace calls for leadership and commitment from all
personnel, in addition to patient teachers who can relate to prisoners
and challenge and involve them. Without such a climate men "sleepwalk"
through school. With it, once it is obtained, the institution is seen
as a better place by inmates and staff alike.
In California, as in all large correction systems, the quality and
type of education vary considerably from institution to institution. Cal-
ifornia's best is very good indeed. Many of the educational programs
encountered are rich in opportunity. The scope of education available to
most inmates is sufficiently broad, from training in literacy to the fifth
grade level to high school and high school equivalency programs, as well
as college correspondence courses. There is also a commendable amount of
vocational education.
There are some 150 trade courses taught in Department of Corrections
facilities, and these take from six months to two years to complete, the
customary length being nine to twelve months.2 Over 1,000 men are enrolled
full time in trade courses with a slightly larger number enrolled on a half-
- 16 -
time basis 3 The variation in degree of sophistication required for differ-
ent courses is good; the courses range from low skill to highly skilled
levels. However, in some cases, especially at the largest institution,
there are waits of six months or more to get into these courses. This is
a major source of low morale and behavior problems among prisoners. If
a program will challenge an inmate, he should be placed in it as soon as
possible rather than be required first to achieve a record of good be-
havior in a waiting period during which he is placed with a concentration
of inmates not in such programs, having poor behavior records, and pres-
suring him to misbehave. The waiting period is often a trap from which
many prisoners fail to escape as they are no longer eligible for the po-
tentially beneficial programs when the waiting period expires, or they
have lost their motivation to participate in such programs.
Although full-time enrollment occurs less in academic than in voca-
tional programs, more students take part-time academic programs, ranging
from basic literacy training through high school level courses. Some col-
lege courses are also available, but mostly through correspondence.
In the interest of improving education and training for California
prisoners, the following suggestions are made:
Inmate students should be paid a nominal sum, comparable with prison
industry scales, at a rate contingent on their individual progress in edu-
cation. This would encourage many to go to school who would otherwise
prefer to take paid work assignments when their primary need is educational.
Reimbursement of students will tell the inmate that the prison administra-
tion considers education as important as producing goods or services for
the institution. It has been well demonstrated with individualized pro-
grammed education and tangible incentives linked to rates of unit comple-
tion that prisoners can experience success in schooling, often their first
success, and several years of schoolwork completion in one year. 4
Two or three hours of evening school should be available for optional
participation in every institution. California has done exceptionally well
in this respect. Yet there are still some institutions with no evening
classes. Evening courses should not be a substitute for full-time educa-
tion. Men who are tired from a day's work cannot absorb learning at maxi-
mum capacity. Evening classes, however, would be attractive and beneficial
for many on work assignments who need training, and for others to enrich their
educational experience. Those who have attained literacy can continue their
basic education in the evening. Evening classes also present an opportunity
for cultural enrichment courses--art, music, literature, etc. California
could further expand its use of volunteer teachers in evening classes.
The use of newer educational techniques, methods and materials should
be expanded. As already suggested, programmed education is especially ef-
fective with prisoners, whether in the form of programmed texts or teaching
machines. It divides training tasks into separate units, each sufficient
to be a challenge but not a frustration, and a new unit is not begun until
the previous one is mastered. Thus, each student experiences continual
success and advances at his own pace. He competes with his own record
- 17 -
rather than with others. This contrasts with traditional classroom teach-
ing where getting behind the class in one unit makes one increasingly un-
successful in subjects where each unit's mastery depends on mastery of
prior units. The normal ego defense against failure is withdrawal from
and derogation of the activity in which one fails; it is this that many
prisoners have experienced and from which they change only with a con-
trasting experience.
Other useful education devices include basal series, educational
television, language and mathematics laboratories, learning carrels, slides,
films on tapes, all of which should be more widely used in California penal
facilities. Some programmed materials are particularly appropriate for
self-study, since they are essentially individual self-study procedures.
Many courses of this type are available in various vocational and techni-
cal fields. Yet it was noted that only a few institutions used programmed
materials extensively. Within the Department of Corrections, a resource
center for lending a wide variety of instructional and informational mate-
rials should be provided to service smaller facilities; larger prisons should
set up their own centers.
There is substantial recognition among correctional educators that
individualized instruction cannot be effective in settings designed only
for group learning. Educational facilities can be sometimes rearranged
for more efficient use of modern types of instruction, but they often must
be remodeled to create learning laboratories with teaching machines and
learning carrels to utilize programmed, self-directed and machine materials.
It should be stressed, however, that classroom instruction should
not be abolished; it should simply be coordinated with individual instruc-
tion, and made more flexible. If a person works alone constantly, his
learning atmosphere soon becomes lonely and this often makes him stagnant.
Group and individual activities blended together by an effective teacher
generate the most motivation and satisfaction in learning.
Educational television, including closed-circuit television, should
be developed. It is possible for local public schools and universities
to assist here. This would provide a wider variety of courses than are
now available, and it would, with California's giant facilities, make
education available to men in locations of the institution other than in
the classroom. In keeping with the belief that greater involvement of
resources outside the correctional system is called for, it is suggested
that the California Department of Corrections explore the use of nearby
schools and their resources for certain prisoners who can safely be re-
leased daily to them. There is much successful precedence for this in
other states.
Camp inmates have complained about a lack of educational programs
at their locations. The camps are set up for inmate labor on forestry
and other outside work projects, and therefore have an explicit policy
of excluding men who need to finish school at the central institutions.
Yet further education programs could benefit many of these men in the
camps. Little in the way of educational opportunities is now offered.
- 18 -
Michigan has tried to improve camp educational opportunities by contracting
for the use of school facilities and teachers from nearby school districts.
The programs (largely vocational) are conducted in the evening and the men
are bussed to the schools where the classrooms and the trade-training shops
are located. These programs are largely voluntary, for the man who has
worked in the forests or elsewhere for a full day and then desires to go
to school in the evening must be highly self-motivated. Evening academic
and "enrichment" courses are also conducted at the camps with teachers,
paid and voluntary, who come to the camp. At some camps the educational
training is conducted by faculty of nearby community colleges. These types
of educational programming would not be needed at all camps if camp or po-
tential camp inmates were screened for educational interests and learning
ability, then placed in camps designated for these programs.
Vocational training equipment and facilities should be improved.
6
Some of the prisons are well equipped for such training but others are not.
In some, the space is inadequate, equipment is obsolete or lacking, and in-
struction is attempted with obsolete material. Most of the institutions
have the nucleus for good vocational training programs and relatively small
sums of money would modernize them and permit much more useful training.
In some prisons new training facilities are needed as there are waiting
lists for assignment to training, due to lack of adequate space.
Job training values of prison industrial and maintenance operation
should be studied and exploited by development of training programs or
integration with present vocational training. Some prison work assign-
ments have much training potential for specific skills, in addition to
providing work habituation. Building maintenance, for example, is a
service occupation with considerable outside employment market. To de-
velop this type of vocational training, each specialized vocational assign-
ment must be analyzed to see what combination of skills might be involved,
to what extent and in what logical sequence, to relate to specific free
world employment requirements. Class work in related theoretical and
technical areas should also be given to place the assignment into proper
context. Indeed, many types of work assignments can be coordinated with
more formal classroom vocational training, including institutional cooking
and baking. The Department of Corrections has made some beginning in this
direction. Examples of this potential include mechanical drawing, where
those who are learning can do sheet metal layouts for maintenance, and
welding, where learners can be used in some institutional repairs and
alterations. There is a tendency in any prison system, and it was noted
in California, to use the vocational shops primarily for maintenance
rather than training. This means that only inmates who already possess
the skills required are assigned to them, thus subverting their use as a
school. This is a condition that repeatedly erodes the educational impact
of prison programs and against which continual vigilance is necessary.
The vocational courses taught in each institution should be re-
evaluated. It is evident that some courses are taught because of tradi-
tion, or of outside pressures, or for other reasons apart from their re-
habilitation value. Courses which cannot be utilized by the students after
they leave the institution are patently wasteful. Many such courses are