By Shawn Fisher, OCCC-Bridgewater
“We cannot solve our problems with the same level of thinking that created them.” – Albert Einstein
Michele Deitch, in a 2021 an article for the Brennan Center wrote, “The United States is an anomaly on the world stage are among the most opaque public institutions in our society. In contrast to our peer nations, most states in this country lack over site mechanisms…” The lack of Massachusetts Department of Correction (MA DOC) oversight creates a black hole of sorts for the taxpayer, where the effective use of tax dollars is difficult if not impossible to gauge. The MA DOC is allowed to allocate much of its $746 million (FY2023) as it sees fit but is not accountable for results or how its spent. In a perverse trend from 2011 onward correctional facilities at the county and state level has decreased.
In a 2016 paper by the public interest group MassINC, it is written that there is a “need for budget makers to take a more active role in helping correctional administrators overcome the inertia that makes it difficult to reallocate dollars within their agencies.” As a recent Boston Globe editorial (Dec. 1, 2021) so succinctly recognized in a headline “Correction Department Cries Out for Oversight.” In an agreement with this statement, we propose creating an independent corrections Oversight Committee whose key objective is to improve inmate and staff safety, reduce litigation, foster good public administration and most importantly reduce recidivism.
An autonomous oversight Committee will be a productive mechanism for brining accountability, consistency, and best practices to a hide-bound institution that operates with impunity. Currently the MA DOC is a bureaucracy that most often is compelled to change or make improvements when pressured by the courts or by negative press. This cannot stand because the taxpayers of Massachusetts deserve a better penal system that is dynamic and responsive to the needs of the Commonwealth and is tasked with rehabilitation. The MA DOC’s goal is to prepare those who have been convicted of a crime to become productive citizens while serving out their sentence. A system that is reactive will never realistically achieve this goal. Independent oversight can be a useful tool for the MA DOC to better deploy the resources that Massachusetts’ taxpayers had entrusted to it, resources that are used to more effectively rehabilitate returning citizens and to lower the rate of recidivism among them. A proactive MA DOC guided by a neutral oversight body is in the best interest of the taxpayers, MA DOC administrators, staff, and officers; who can use the Oversight Committee to deal with officer grievances and protest staff from abuse by superiors, and ultimately incarcerated citizens.
A prison system tasked with rehabilitating its incarcerated citizens functions best when it is a system focused on restorative justice and not retributive ideas of justice. A prison system focused on retribution is not transforming criminals into productive members of society. Instead, it should be organized around and work on restoring the imprisoned so they can learn from past wrongful decisions and actions while making amends to those they can learn from past wrongful decisions and actions while making amends to those victimized by their crime. Too often those victimized and affected by crime are either neglected or at worst are re-victimized by a justice system which leaves them with few answers, many unresolved questions, and inadequate resolution. An oversight committee can help ensure the MA DOC is part of a system of restoration, not retribution, and is most effective in restoring citizens and not wasting human potential.
This article was compiled with excerpts from a position paper on “Why MA DOC Needs Oversight” written by the Old Colony Correctional Centers Lifers’ Group, which this author chaired. For more information on MA DOC Oversight Committee or to view other position papers authored by this group, please contact Patrick Grier W96693, One Administration Road, Bridgewater, MA, 02324.
