From Prison Po;icy Initiative:
Prisons and jails maintain “welfare funds” that are supposed to benefit incarcerated people, but often use the money to shore up their budgets or spend it on treats for themselves.
When incarcerated people and their loved ones pay for phone calls or commissary goods, it creates revenue for companies, which kick back some of the money to the facilities themselves. This money is funneled into “inmate welfare funds.” But what happens to it then? In our report Shadow Budgets, we revealed that prisons and jails often use the funds not for special purchases on behalf of incarcerated people, but to shore up their own operating budgets — or even to pay for perks for themselves.
In one county — Dauphin County, Pennsylvania — the local paper exposed the jail using its welfare fund for purchases as inappropriate as fitness trackers and gun range memberships for staff. Continue reading >>>
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