Can state budget cuts lead to an increase in crime? That’s the fear as adult education programs at San Quentin and other California prisons try to implement a 45% reduction in funding.

With a budget for adult services that has been slashed by 45%, deep cuts are inevitable, admits Elizabeth Siggins from the California Department of Corrections’ office of Adult Programs (left) . Here, she outlines the steps being taken as her department tries to get the maximum social benefit from the money that remains.

One of the programs at San Quentin that will feel the burden of the cuts is the Robert E. Burton Adult School.  Although California does not have data specific to this state, Elizabeth Siggins says studies from other sources affirm the value of inmate education as a tool for reducing recidivism.

While the precise benefits of inmate education have not been quantified in California, the Correctional Educational Journal asserts that "every dollar spent on education saves $2 for taxpayers through reduced recidivism." The cost and effectiveness of educational programs within the California Corrections Department was examined at length in a February 2008 study by the State Legislative Analyst's Office.  Included in that study is the graph below, which compares the cost-effectiveness of inmate education programs with other adult prison services.

Yes, Virginia, tomorrow is an election day—just not for most of Sonoma County.

Ukiah Daily Journal Editor K.C. Meadows explains the reasons behind her paper’s decision to take an editorial position against Measure A, the ballot measure that would approve a huge new mall project on the site of the city’s former Masonite plant.

The status of the proposed Mendocino Crossings site as a former industrial property is another point of contention. Supporters of the project say it would clean up the industrial wastes that were left there; opponents would rather keep it open for other options.

The website for the Yes on A campaign is here.  And the No on A campaign is here.

Marin County political observer and commentator Dick Spotswood says that there are several ballot measures to provide additional funding for local schools across the county, and history suggests they will fare well on Tuesday, even those with a high threshold for approval.

Dick Spotswood is a columnist for the Marin Independent Journal. He blogs about Marin politics at The Militant Centrist.

U.S. law gives constitutional rights to corporations. Now a countervailing legal theory is emerging that defines and defends the legal rights of the environment.

Mari Margill is Associate Director of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, based in their West Coast office in Portland, Oregon. But as she explains here, the organization's origins lie in Pennsylvania.


Obtaining legal standing for nature, says Margill, requires enacting new laws to spell that out, something that is beginning to happen in scattered local jurisdictions, but faces an uncertain future on appeal.

For more information about CELFD click here.

The Marin Municipal Water District has taken another significant step toward building a saltwater desalination facility to stabilize their water supplies, but critics remain adamantly opposed to the project.

Paul Heliker (right), General Manager of the MMWD, believes that the desalination facility is needed to protect Marin residents from possible future droughts and the economic havoc they could cause.

Sharp questions about the safety and purity of the desalinated water were raised again at this week’s water district meeting, but Heliker says those concerns should have been settled by the results of the district’s own tests of the reverse osmosis technology with the same water that the larger plant would use.

Adam Scow, California Deputy Director for water programs for the national consumer advocacy group, Food and Water Watch, is among the vocal skeptics who question the need and cost of the proposed desalination plant. He points to a report commissioned by his organization that disputes the underlying assumptions the district uses to make its case for the project. You can read that report here.

For its part, the district has prepared a 9-page slide show on their desalination project, which is much easier to digest than the full Environmental Impact Report, which is posted here. At left is a map showing where the proposed plant would be situated.