Florida Prisons

A former inmate has turned his life around by using art to spotlight issues in the state’s criminal justice system.

TALLAHASSEE — Lawyers for convicted felons filed a class-action lawsuit Monday against Florida officials, alleging that the state's process for restoring voting rights to people who have completed their sentences is arbitrary.

A deal on the state's public-safety budget that lawmakers reached late Friday would not give the Department of Corrections the 734 additional positions the agency says are necessary to make Florida's prisons more secure.

The new jobs were part of an effort by the department to have corrections officers work eight-hour shifts instead of 12-hour shifts. The department has been reeling from a series of reports about issues such as contraband smuggling and abuse of inmates.

Inmates won't be reading a newspaper banned by Florida corrections officials anytime soon, due to a decision by a Tallahassee federal judge who said the publication's advertisements pose a threat to security.

But in a ruling last week, U.S. District Judge Mark E. Walker also handed a partial victory to Prison Legal News, finding that Department of Corrections officials violated the publication's constitutional due-process rights by failing to provide notification when copies of the monthly periodical were impounded.

The deaths of two inmates at Baker Correctional Institution in Sanderson, Florida last week have sparked call for reform of the state’s correctional system.

Florida has the third-largest prison system in the nation, with more than 100,000 inmates and a $2.1 billion budget.

During an appearance on WJCT's “First Coast Connect,” Criminal Justice Analyst Dale Carson and Wendy Tatter, a representative for the St. Augustine nonprofit Initiative for Compassion, talked about prison reform in Florida.

Florida Department of Corrections Secretary Julie Jones plans to bar the use of chemical agents on prisoners with histories of respiratory ailments and is changing procedures to reduce the use of force on severely mentally ill inmates.

The changes to the policy regarding inmates with respiratory ailments, such as asthma, come after reports of at least two prisoners dying as a result of complications from preexisting breathing-related medical conditions. The inmates had been gassed by guards.

Businesses could get a tax break for hiring former felons – that’s if a bill filed by Miami Democratic Senator Dwight Bullard gets approved this session. The bill would give companies hiring a convicted felon a $1,000 tax credit. The credit applies to the corporate income tax, which not all businesses have to pay, but Bullard says it’s a way for the program to get a solid foot in the door.