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Ivey, a Republican, called a special session of the Alabama legislature on Monday to discuss how to resolve what she called a decades-long problem. As part of the solution, Ivey offered to use up to $ 400 million in federal Covid-19 relief money, up to $ 785 million in bonds and no more than $ 154 million from the Fund. General of the State to add new prisons and renovate others in the state.
The federal bailout was enacted to help states fill budget holes in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, but the Biden administration has issued general guidelines on how the funds can be used, including compensation for lost revenue to protect “vital public services”. The administration also encouraged state and local governments to use some of the funding to deal with a summer spike in violent crime.
Using federal money on prisons would help all Alabamians, according to Ivey, who pitched the idea as easing the burden on taxpayers during prison construction.
“The Democrat-controlled federal government has never had a problem spending billions of dollars on their favorite ideological projects,” Ivey said.
in a published press release on Twitter Tuesday, calling the state’s prison infrastructure “broken.” The point is that the American Rescue Plan Act allows these funds to be used for lost income and sending a letter in the last hour will not change the way the law is written. These prisons need to be built. , and we have crafted a conservative tax plan that will cost Alabamians the least amount of money to get the solution required. ”
Ivey was responding to a letter from House Judiciary Jerry Nadler to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, asking her on Monday to “take all appropriate steps to prevent the misuse” of funds by Alabama and others States.
“Directing funding to protect our citizens from a pandemic to fuel mass incarceration is in direct violation of the objectives of ARP legislation and will particularly harm communities of color that are already disproportionately affected by over- incarceration and this public health crisis, “Nadler wrote.” It should not be used to exacerbate our national problem of over-incarceration. “
CNN has contacted the Treasury Department for comment.
“We could use this money on mental health, on our sewage system. Covid is still ongoing, we should use this money on our health system,” Pastor Robert White, who heads the Legal Advocacy Group, which is lobbying for inmates, ‘CNN told CNN. “We’re not saying prisons don’t need to be built. We’re saying this money has to go to mental health, to education, not to a plantation in the middle of nowhere. The problem doesn’t change. . The murders don’t stop you. “
White, who was part of a coalition that includes the Legal Advocacy Group as well as a group of students from Communities Not Prisons who successfully lobbied against the construction of private prisons several months ago, says he is now focuses on keeping the CARES law money. used to build these new prisons.
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