Here is the feel good story of the year: Pennsylvania is about to officially run out of prison space. To deal with the incarceration crisis, state officials are taking the drastic step of re-locating about 2,000 offenders to out-of-state facilities. The move will happen early next year.

According to a story from NBC 10, the state is already building a bunch of new prisons. However, that can't be the long-term solution to the problem for financial reasons.

Prison construction is the most expensive option for taxpayers. The four prisons now on the drawing board -- two on the grounds of Graterford prison in Montgomery County, one at Rockview prison in Centre County and one in Fayette County -- are expected to make available 8,000 beds by 2013 at a cost of about $800 million.

Officials said nonviolent offenders, mostly people convicted of property and drug crimes, account for more than half of the admissions surge. He and other speakers advocated changes to divert more of those people into community programs and reduce the number of parolees returned to prison for minor “technical” violations.

Prisons are expensive, so the state should be looking for alternative ways to handle the rising inmate population. However, the taxpayers are stil going to be footing the bill to send offenders to other states. Wouldn't it make more sense to also examine our sentencing laws and figure out if there are alternatives to incarcerating non-violent offenders?

What do you think? Sound off in the comments!

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Momentum for reform in Harrisburg is building, at least in the newspapers. We mentioned on Friday that one could respond cynically to Governor Rendell's end-of-term declaration that he wants to try to clean up the capital through redistricting, merit selection of judges and campaign finance reform. Today, John Baer shows exactly how cynical one could get:

"So [Rendell] enters his last year in an office he can't seek again and wants campaign-finance limits with no lobbyists? This after building a career soliciting and collecting roughly a bazillion dollars from any lobbyist with breath and from any sensate being with a checkbook?"

Like the DN editorial board, though, Baer tries to find the good in this situation. He says that any talk of reform is welcome, and finishes his column by challenging Rendell to take himself seriously:

"If serious about changing the political culture, Rendell should take the $2 million he still has in separate campaign accounts, use his prodigious fundraising skills to get more and mount an independent, statewide reform effort."

Meanwhile, Dave Davies expresses incredulity at another Harrisburg norm: partisan budgeting.

"Of the $276 million in the Legislature's budget, roughly two-thirds is allocated along party lines.

"There's $57 million in the state Senate budget for 'Caucus Operations (R) and (D).' In the state House, we find $10 million each allotted to Republican and Democratic 'Special Leadership Accounts,' and $19 million each for 'Legislative Management Committees.'"

Davies dubs these "slush funds," and says they "invite exactly the kind of mischief alleged by grand juries in the Bonusgate probes." Harrisburgians try to tell him that things have always been done this way. Davies thinks that's a bad reason to do something poorly.

Finally, the Inquirer ran a story yesterday about Sue Cornell, a former State Rep. from Montgomery County who says that after being booted from office by voters, she was given a well-paying no-show job by John Perzel. This is the kind of thing that people assume happens in Harrisburg (and Philly) all the time. But the details are not as often spelled out for public consumption.

The bottom line is here is that a key to reform in Harrisburg -- as pointed out by the DN and by the governor himself -- is a sufficient amount of public engagement and anger across the state about the practices of our elected leaders (man, did it take some restraint not to put scare quotes around "leaders" right there). Officials need to believe they're being watched, and feel that their jobs are threatened. We don't know where the tipping point is, but the causes for anger keep piling higher.

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Congressman Sestak

We told you on Thursday that Republicans and some Democrats were slamming Recovery.gov for being full of errors. In a story published Friday, U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak expressed his own frustration with the stimulus. Sestak, who is running for the Democratic nomination for Senate against Sen. Arlen Specter, told the political website Politico that Democrats may have promised too much, too quickly. Says Politico:

According to Sestak, moderate and conservative-leaning independents are particularly unnerved by a sense that Washington’s plans for economic recovery seem to be working slowly, if at all.

“There’s no such thing as a shovel-ready job. We oversold things,” Sestak said in a phone interview from York County, where he was participating in an event with veterans over the weekend.

Keep an eye on this debate in the coming months, since Congress many consider passing another jobs bill in 2010.

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The cynical take on Gov. Rendell's announcement that he wants to spend his last year in Harrisburg pursuing governmental reforms is that the plan is all talk. Basically, the argument goes, you've got a lame duck executive making promises he can't keep so that when he leaves office he can say, "hey, I tried."

But check out the DN's take on this today: Not this time. Not with all the recent scandals in Harrisburg.

Whether the governor expects his plan to work or not, the public should get behind him. We should make the governor take his own agenda seriously -- and enable him to move it forward.

Rendell has identified some of the most important reforms you could ask for in Harrisburg: campaign finance, redistricting, and judicial merit selection. And maybe, just maybe, the time for these ideas has come. Says the DN:

All of these changes threaten the status quo. The problem is, they also require action from the Legislature, whose members like their quo to remain static. But this is a time when public push-back could make a big difference. Outraged citizens should call their state lawmakers' office, and tell them that unless they want a repeat of the blood that followed the pay-raise scandal, they ought to pay attention.

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A few weeks ago, in the inaugural (and thus far only -- but not for long!) installment of our "Follow the (lack of) money" series, Anthony detailed the circumstances and potential ramifications of a reduction in funding for Philly's Housing Trust Fund.

To oversimplify the matter: Mayor Nutter came in to office and committed $15 million over five years to the fund, which leverages the money to bring in state and federal grants that finance affordable housing work (both rehab and new construction). When the city's finances went south, Nutter reduced that commitment, and then reduced it again. The projected five-year city commitment now stands at $6 million.

This reduction is exacerbated by the fact that the fund's other source of revenue, real estate transfer taxes, are also way down.

At the same time, the reduction is mitigated by the fact that affordable housing in Philadelphia (though not the trust fund) received a bump this year from stimulus money.

Part of the idea behind "Follow the (lack of) money" is to give you, dear reader, a sense of the cuts being made to the city budget, so you can assess the damage and the city's approach. Implicit in the Housing Trust Fund piece was the question, "Is this cut a reasonable thing for the city to do?"

This morning, we see that Councilman Darrell Clarke doesn't seem to think so. From the Inquirer:

Councilman Darrell L. Clarke proposed an increase in the percentage of recording fees that go to the city's Housing Trust Fund. The fund has sunk from $13.8 million in 2007 to $8.3 million. Funding of affordable housing has been an issue between Clarke and Mayor Nutter since Nutter became mayor in 2008.

This isn't the same thing as restoring Nutter's cut -- it's upping the fund's other source of revenue. But it is trying to make up for it.

If you have strong feelings about the Trust Fund cut Anthony detailed, this seems like a good opportunity to try to make your voice heard about it. Council's going to be considering a bill to re-commit city money for this purpose; contact your council person and let him or her know what you think. And by all means, tell us in comments, too.

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Yesterday, we reported that the GOP was slamming President Obama for mistakes on Recovery.gov, the website where the public can track $787 billion in stimulus funding. The site lists projects in non-existent congressional districts. Today, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review has a response from the Obama Administration.

According to Ed Pound, a spokesman for the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, the problem didn't originate with the federal government.

Pound said recipients of the money are to blame for the misreporting.

They are required to file detailed quarterly reports on money they receive, to a private government Web site called FederalReporting.gov. The reporting forms include nearly 100 blanks recipients must fill in, including the congressional district in which the money will be spent.

Those reports automatically transfer to the public Web site, Recovery.gov — unaltered or reviewed by anyone with the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, or anyone else in government, Pound said.

"Nobody is playing with this data. There is no manipulation. What you have is recipients filing information that is incorrect. You're dealing with human beings, and human beings make mistakes," Pound said.

What do think? Do you buy this explanation or is there more to the story? Let us know in the comments section!

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Thanks to the indictment of state Rep. John Perzel (R-Pa.), we’ve been hearing a lot lately about shady government use of computer systems.

Well, today Bob Warner writes about a longstanding effort by the city’s Board of Ethics to use computing technology to give voters more information.

The board settled a battle between Municipal Court Judge Thomas N. Nocella and contractor Ernesto DeNofa over their failure in 2007 to submit computerized reports of campaign contributions and expenditures.

DeNofa and Nocella both worked for the Appreciation Fund, a political action committee started by the late Councilwoman Carol Ann Campbell. The PAC ignored warnings from the board about producing computerized campaign records and then balked at paying the fines it was assessed.

The PAC allegedly went to great lengths to avoid paying the fines, which totaled $39,000, draining its bank account after it lost a decision in Common Pleas Court about paying the fines.

But the Ethics Board persevered, arguing that DeNofa and Nocella should pay the fines out of their own pockets. Each has agreed to pay $8,220 to settle the dispute. A lawyer for the two has admitted this will help strengthen existing campaign finance laws.

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At least one elected official thinks this week's charges against State Rep. John Perzel should lead to sweeping reforms. Gov. Ed Rendell announced yesterday that he will spend the remainder of his time in office pursuing major changes in Harrisburg.

Rendell, who will be out of the office at the end of 2010, said the culture of corruption has hurt his policy agenda and must change.

"We've done great things legislatively [but] get virtually no credit for it because we have a process that's broken," Rendell told reporters at a press conference. "Special interests still dominate the scene here in Harrisburg."

The governor made three specific proposals: campaign finance reform, merit selection for judges, and changing the redistricting process. Below are the details, as described by the Associated Press.

Rendell renewed his pitch for imposing the first-ever limits on state campaign contributions, ending the election of appellate judges, and giving citizens control over the redrawing of legislative districts every 10 years.
....
Rendell's campaign-finance plan would limit contributions to candidates for statewide office by individuals or political committees to $5,000 and set limits on total contributions during any two-year election cycle. Current law prevents corporations from giving to campaigns but imposes no monetary limits.

Rendell is a lame-duck at this point, so passage of these reforms will be difficult. Here is the real question: Will the public show enough outrage to force the legislature to act? What do you think?

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Why is the Pennsylvania Republican Party criticizing the Obama adminstration for $12 million in recovery funds that came to this state?

The stimulus projects being tracked on the federal government's recovery.gov include a total of $12 million for the 00th, 96th, 21st and 65th congressional district.

The problem? These don't exist in Pennsylvania.

“While many Pennsylvania are still waiting for something positive to come of the stimulus, I guess those living in the 00th congressional district can be proud [of] President Obama, Senator Specter, and Democratic congressional members for 'creating' so many jobs,” said GOP chairman Rob Cleason. “Obama needs to let Pennsylvanias know if and how stimulus money was spent in congressional districts that don't exist.”

The problem is not confined to Pennsylvania. Numerous mistakes in the stimulus progress reports submitted to Congress last month generated similar charges in other parts of the country. For example, Rep. Rob Bishop (R - Utah) mocked the Obama Administration in the the Salt Lake City Tribune for listing $1.1 million in a non-existent congressional district.

“This is great news,” said Bishop. “Who needs to count Mormon missionaries in the Census when according to the Executive Branch, Utah already has a 4th seat in Congress!”

The criticism has not be limited to Republicans. Rep. David Obey (D – Wisconsin), the powerful chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, issued a rare statement rebuking the Obama Administration for the errors.

“The inaccuracies on recovery.gov that have come to light are outrageous and the administration owes itself, the Congress, and every American a commitment to work night and day to correct the ludicrous mistakes," said Obey in a statement released yesterday. “Credibility counts in government and stupid mistakes like this undermine it. We’ve got too many serious problems in this country to let that happen."

Obama Administration officials have promised to go through the reports and correct the mistakes.

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