Diversion Center Shutdown Unsafe

The Gainesville Diversion center is going to be summarily shut down to save some money.  Saving money is ALWAYS a good thing for government to do.  But do we save some money at the risk of our safety?  Not a good trade.  Like military, public safety is one area you don’t skimp on.

Diversion centers are the places that the probation department can send people to instead of prison when they are too high risk to just release on probation.  The inmates have to work to be there, and the length of stay is up to the behavior of the inmate, and if they misbehave they get sent to prison.  Diversion centers are a good (and cheaper) alternative to the prison system for non-violent felony offenders.

I can’t see how closing any of them would be cheaper AND saferat the same time.  Sure shutting down a facility would save money, but where do the inmates go?  I’m betting they will just be released on regular probation, not sent to another center or to prison.  Probation officers are already overworked and supervising probationers is like herding cats to start with.  So this sudden increase of inmates will just be released to YOUR neighborhood with much less supervision than they have now.

It would be cheaper to just shut down the whole Department of Corrections, but the prisoners need to be housed separately from the rest of society because they are DANGEROUS.  We can save money by shutting down the Sheriff’s Department and Police Departments too.  Hello?  Less is more, but not when it is less public safety.

Read The Times here–>Many lament loss of diversion center

From the story it seems like this is a hack job on North Georgia by the Atlanta crowd.