The Legislature has often stumbled into trouble when it snatches functions from the executive branch. Getting the state to buy airplanes for firefighting comes to mind. But here the state administration shares the blame. It has kept mum while this private prison situation developed. It has not introduced the necessary facilities expansion bill this year and initiated no debate about alternatives.
Executive leadership is in default.
Normally the Legislature and executive are a check on each other when big private hands are heading for the public pocket, but in this private prison deal, the Legislature, the lobbyists' buddies, and an administration without backbone are all part of the problem. We have put more and more young men in jails for longer sentences, but they still come back to the community. It makes more sense to expand local facilities in each community for the short-term prisoners that belong to that community. They can, as appropriate, keep in touch with their families and have better prospects on release. Lesser offenders among the 40 percent of Alaska prisoners who Rep. Albert Kookesh says are Alaska Natives should also be housed near the communities from which they come.