Oregon Strategist

Reinventing the Oregon Dream

Prison Reform and Mandatory Minimum Sentencing

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prison-370112_960_720Our jails are a reflection of our national character and who we are as a society. There is much to be critical about when it comes to the United States holding more than twenty (20) percent of the world’s incarcerated population – manifested out of President Richard Nixon’s war on drugs in 1971.

Mandatory minimum sentences and strict drug laws have swelled our prison population, stripping our judiciary of any flexibility and discretion in doling out prison terms for non-violent offenders of the law. Context is everything in distributing justice in a balanced, fair, and neutral manner. Mandatory minimum sentences throw context out the window and leave our legal system rigid, inflexible and limp.

Currently, American citizens spend roughly $80 billion per year housing their prison population. This is approximately $260 per person per year. Ten (10) percent of this figure is paid to private prisons. Private prisons have an incentive to fill beds. Mandatory minimum sentences insulate their funding. While ten (10) percent may seem a small amount, the private prison industry wields tremendous influence in lobbying the government, even in the area of immigration reform.

Our legal system should be allowed a malleable approach to the law and its offenders. In overhauling our drug laws and lifting the bureaucratic mandatory minimum sentencing, we free up valuable resources for job training, education, and instilling in our culture a value of hard work and the fulfillment of dreams. We need not the continual drain on our human capital as we allow it to rot behind the bars of our prisons, sucking down our tax dollars and tarnishing these people with criminal histories that will prohibit future employment and positive growth. No. Our nation requires labor, ingenuity, principle and dedication to surface our debt and propel our global advantage in this century of American pride.

Immigration Reform: Preserve and Protect

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Gang of EightThe Border Security, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act of 2013, or the “Gang of Eight” bill, made significant headlines this week as the Senate proceeded to debate, amend, and pass the most significant overhaul of U.S. immigration law in over a generation. The bill will now proceed to the House of Representatives where it stands a difficult test.

The Gang of Eight bill would grant citizenship to over 11 million undocumented individuals. Success in the Senate hinged on a compromise amendment brought forward by Republicans to increase border security spending by $38 billion which would add an additional 20,000 border security agents, new fencing, electronic surveillance and unmanned drones.

What does this bill mean for Oregon? According to the Pew Hispanic Center, Oregon is home to 160,000 undocumented individuals. Providing a path to citizenship for these folks will help ensure the integrity of their families, will potentially lower crime, and will enhance their access to justice as they will no longer feel the need to hide in the corners of our society.

Immigration reform has long been overdue. Oregon’s north-south Willamette Valley stretch and the rolling grainfields and orchards east of its Cascades employ between 90,000 and 150,000 farmworkers – many of them undocumented. Immigration reform will bring them into the legal, competitive market. Their full citizenship will correspond with full taxpayer status.

The Senate’s passage of the Gang of Eight bill follows the passage of Oregon Senate Bill 833 on May 1st that legalized short-term driver’s licenses for folks illegally residing within the state. The law was passed with rapid fanfare (three weeks after the first public hearing was held), and while critics claim it has the potential to attract more undocumented immigrants to the state, the downsides to the law are significantly ameliorated by the upsides, especially in the event that the Gang of Eight bill is passed by the U.S. House of Representatives.

Consider the citizen-children of undocumented individuals. Many of these citizens would not be able to attend school or other community activities. Providing these citizens with the opportunities afforded to other citizens is crucial for creating a strong and diverse economy and society. Allowing undocumented individuals short-term drivers licenses increases taxes, puts money into the economy through insurance and gasoline purchases and enhances access to many other Oregon businesses. Issuing drivers licenses to undocumented individuals does little harm to our state and addresses an immediate need felt by their citizen-children who rely upon this legislation to realize the Oregon Dream.

Additionally, a buttressed border and enhanced guest worker program (the former provided by the Gang of Eight bill) is essential to ensuring that immigration occurs through the proper channels. In offering shelter to the homeless, churches and non-profits that provide such services go through a process of registration and procedure. Likewise, the government must ensure the protection of its citizens and the procedure of its immigration.

Finally, this legislation must be accompanied by stronger penalties for hiring undocumented workers. While this will undoubtedly raise the price of our food, such is the cost of ensuring that human rights are protected. If no one is hiring undocumented workers to begin with, the problems that flow from the inherent inequality in their labor are ameliorated.