Public Defense

Gideon?s suggestions for reducing the budget deficit in CT

By Gideon

I know no one asked, but I am nothing if not a bloviator, so these are my suggestions for reducing (even in small part) the current budget deficit that CT faces. In the style of a letter to our Governor.

Dear Governor Rell,

You and I haven’t always gotten along. In fact, it’s no secret that I don’t like your views on criminal justice and your disregard for the “rule of law”. But these are strange times and strange times make strange bedfellows - or in our case, strange letter writers and recipients.

So, in the spirit of bi-partisanship so convincingly advocated for by our C-in-C, I propose the following changes that could save the State some money, even if it isn’t much. Perhaps it can save a job or two.

1. Stop publication of the Law Reports. In this day and age, there really is no reason for hundreds of thousands of copies of the Law Reports to be made every single week, year after year. No one really reads them, anyway. Just make one PDF file and upload it to the Judicial website. Anyone who wants a paper copy can download the damn thing and print it out on their own dime.
2. You know that the general statutes are available online, right? For free? Yet, agencies buy them for $335 a set. I can tell you that every single attorney I know has a full set for himself/herself. Let’s stop this spending.
3. Permit liquor sales on Sunday. More liquor sales = more tax revenue. Liquor sales on Sundays = happy people.
4. Decriminalize possession of marijuana, eliminate the excess penalties for sale w/in 1500 feet of any city object and remove mandatory-minimum sentences.
5. Eliminate the death penalty. A study concluded that NJ spent $253 million on the death penalty over 20 years. The NJ public defender’s office reported [pdf - page 31] that it would save $1.46 million per year if the death penalty were abolished. Who knows how much the State or corrections spends. I’m sure our numbers aren’t that different.

Madam Governor, these are but small measures that can save costs and help reduce the deficit. Don’t forget to read the comments, where my readers (who are generally much smarter than I) may make additional suggestions that would help reduce the deficit further.

Critically,

Gideon

Full post as published by A Public Defender on February 09, 2009 (boomark / email).