GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Seventeen legislative bills introduced by a group of Democratic lawmakers are aimed at improving conditions in Wisconsin’s prisons. The authors say current conditions, in prisons across the state, are unacceptable – even inhumane.
The “Conditions of Confinement” bill package, introduced last week, would set minimum standards for things like visitation, personal hygiene, and prison labor. Lawmakers who wrote the bills believe they will not only improve conditions for both inmates and correctional officers on the inside — but they will also help to prepare those who are incarcerated to become productive members of society upon their release.
The bills are the first major step taken by democratic lawmakers to address the prison problem, something State Representative David Steffen, a republican from Green Bay, has been vocal about for nearly a decade.
State Representative David Steffen doesn’t mince words when talking about Green Bay Correctional Institution or GBCI, as well as, the state prison in Waupun. He said, “We have a couple of core inhumane facilities that exist for the care and control of inmates, maximum security inmates. We can’t have facilities that don’t have working plumbing, working electrical, working HVAC. It’s not accepted under the law and we have a responsibility to do this correctly.”
While Steffen says the “Conditions of Confinement” package of bills is a step in the right direction, and he’s happy to see democratic lawmakers recognizing the issues in some state prisons, he doesn’t think the bills do enough.
According to Steffen, “The reality is, it is very much a Band-Aid. If we want to address this issue for another couple generations, we need to replace these 125 year old facilities.”
For nearly a decade, Rep. Steffen has been pushing to have GBCI and Waupun closed and replaced with a new facility. He says when he first introduced the idea, the cost of a new facility would have been about $350-million. It has now ballooned into a $500-million project.
“It doesn’t become cheaper the longer we wait,” added Steffen.
Faith based social justice organizations like JOSHUA, which stands for Justice Organization Sharing Hope & United for Action, agree something needs to be done. And while they support aspects of the “Conditions of Confinement” bill, when it comes to helping inmates more on the inside to prepare them better for the outside, they also believe facilities like GBCI need to be replaced for everyone’s safety.
“We want the human decency to brought back to not only the individuals living there, but also the guards. The guards have got to be worried as well. Great, we give them more money to work there but that doesn’t help if people are still on lockdown and there’s this volatile craziness going on over there right now,” said Sara Williams with JOSHUA.
With democrats are onboard, Steffen is hoping Governor Evers will now start paying more attention to the prison problem and work with lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to come up with a solution, adding, “Ultimately, we’re going to need the governor to be providing leadership on this issue and I hope it’s in our next budget. I can tell you if he’s willing to work with me and others that have been working on this for several years he will have partnership and we will put politics aside and ensure this is done correctly.”
