Central Valley Lawmaker: California Should Give Counties More Money to Fund Realignment

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Credit Office of Anthony Cannella

State Senator Anthony Cannella (R-Ceres) - (file photo)

A California lawmaker says the shift of tens of thousands of state prisoners to county supervision has become a strain for some counties.  As Marianne Russ reports from Sacramento, he wants the state to give those counties more money.

Republican State Senator Anthony Cannella says under Governor Jerry Brown’s realignment program, some counties are dealing with a lot more offenders than others.  And he says it has strained their resources.  Cannella says the state shifted the responsibility for the inmates– and it should also shift the money it’s saving:

“This is a large savings for the state of California, except that money is now being sent to other areas and it’s not being invested in realignment, which I believe that was the deal.”

Cannella has introduced legislation that would require all savings under realignment to be passed on to counties.  Under the bill, counties with a larger percentage of offenders would also get a larger share of the funds.

According to the Department of Finance, realignment is saving the state about $1.5 billion a year, and it passes about 60 percent of that on to counties.  The Brown administration says counties can run cheaper programs.