Ok. So constituents have contacted me about Councilman Dee Andrews' plan to offer job training and other services to soon to be released prisoners. I do honestly believe that Dee's heart is in the right place and he understands that if we don't train those returning from incarceration they are more than likely to return to crime and be imprisoned at the taxpayers' expense.
Nevertheless. This isn't a good idea for Long Beach. Not right now. Not when 14.5% of our population in unemployed and I suspect many more underemployed. The City doesn't have the money nor the resources, nor should this be on our list of things to do.
The City should explore whether or not to sue the State of California and/or the County of Los Angeles if either level of government prematurely releases prisoners into our City. It's bad enough that the State had raided our coffers and continues to dump parolees into communities, but to let prisoners get out early when the governor and legislature refuses to do their jobs is unthinkable.
To use City resources to provide services for the prisoners isn't appropriate. Let's spend what resources we have on preventing our youth from committing the crimes that is putting their elders in prison.
