When officials in Richmond, California, learned in 2009 that 70 percent of the city's murders and firearms assaults were directly linked to 17 people, they decided on a bold program: to pay off those 17 to behave themselves.
For a budget of about $1.2 million a year, the program offers individual coaching, health care coverage and several hundred dollars a month in stipends to former thugs who stick to their "life map" of personal goals and conflict-resolution training.
According to an April report on National Public Radio's "This American Life," Richmond is no longer among the most dangerous towns in America, with the murder rate in fact having fallen from its all-time yearly high of 62 to 11 last year. [WBEZ Radio (Chicago) via News.com.au (Sydney, Australia), 4-30-2015]
Isn't that kind of reverse blackmail? Maybe...but considering the cost of keeping the 17 bad guys behind bars for years into the future, perhaps it is a cheaper alternative. Me? I read from time to time about all the remote complexes and underground facilities the governments have and I wonder if it wouldn't make sense to take all serious offenders (male and female) to a remote location up north...way up north...and have them build a city. Sure, it would have to be policed...maybe a new force would have to be initiated...hey, there's a new job creation initiative in itself!
The idea is that the city would have a phased-in target of self-sufficiency which eventually would pay for the policing as well as all other needed city functions and community services. Hey, wasn't that how Australia started?
See ya, eh!
Bob
Comment from Stewart in Cornwall:
Cornwall/OPP/RCMP make a $100,000 bust - only cost $1.75 mil to make it happen - another $1.2 mil to prosecute, then the consequences...another $ 2 mil to hold them in the meantime...
Bob's response:
My sentiment exactly! Justice is expensive... perhaps we need an alternative way of dealing with crime.
0 comments:
Post a Comment