Va. Parole Board sparks controversy, as always
Questions arise over role and influence of inspetor general
A huge red light ought to flash in the Governor’s Office every time the state Parole Board convenes.
That might at least remind everyone that when the board starts working, everyone else should start worrying.
It has been ever so — or, at least, since 1942, when Virginia first installed its parole apparatus. We can thank Gov. Colgate Darden for that innovation and more on that in a moment.
But what about this business about an inspector general? In the present controversy over the Parole Board, there is an inspector general in the mix.
No such state government animal existed in the 1980s, when I served in the Virginia Governor’s Office — and there’s a halfway decent argument that the concept’s deficiencies exceed the benefits. Just who’s in charge?
That goes for the federal government, too, and here’s what I love: Donald Trump, in 2018, on Twitter: “What is taking so long with the Inspector General’s Report on Crooked Hillary and Slippery James Comey?”
In other words, sic ‘em.
Two years later, however, Trump senses danger to himself and now has federal IGs in the crosshairs, even those in the Defense Department charged with coronavirus spending oversight. “Did I hear the word inspector general? Really? Give me the name of the inspector!” Trump demands.
“Could politics be entered into that?”
Well, yes, Mr. President, in all likelihood, you’re correct. You know, just like when you were trying to exploit an inspector general’s inquiries into Clinton.
Even so, Trump had a point — or at least he did in the second instance. Does anyone really believe you can hire intelligent people to be inspector generals —
including all assembled administrative staff — and expect them to arrive without opinions?
Or fail to develop a perspective — we’re talking a political perspective — on what passes before them? Do these inspectors take vows of political celibacy, is that what everyone thinks?
Dream on. So now there’s a person down in the bowels of state government, perhaps a subaltern of a subaltern of the IG in charge, and this person has a point of view on who gets paroled and how the parole board should function.
Again, you can argue the sensibility of these arrangements.
You can debate the relative cost/ benefits and lines of authority.
For myself, show me an engaged IG and I will show you a political fiasco preparing to blossom.
Only, the arguments will never get but so far on the subject of parole, a business forever pregnant with political possibilities,
inspector general or not.
Want some fun history? Then let’s go back Gov. Darden, Virginia’s World War II governor. He wanted to drag the commonwealth into the 20th century, its correctional mentality then being located roughly in the Middle Ages.
No exaggeration. It was reported as such at the time, that getting away from Virginia’s then-existing fee structure would terminate 300 years of bad habits — habits that did, in fact, run back to English practices, long removed.
The fee structure? That’s how country sheriffs and city sergeants got paid. There were no salaries. Instead, sheriffs or sergeants received a per diem for every prisoner held in custody.
In Augusta County, for instance, if you had up to two prisoners, the sheriff received $1 per day per person from whatever agency was responsible — local
or state — for having arrested that person. Should the sheriff end up with more than 50 prisoners, the fee dropped down to 25 cents per person.
How did local officials make out on these deals? By spending as little on the prisoners as possible, including on facility maintenance and food. The incentives involved produced wretched local jail conditions in Virginia.
Darden said enough and the General Assembly agreed in
1942 on a legislative package labeled by the Associated Press as “perhaps the most complete penal reformation that has ever been achieved in any American state in a comparable 12-month of history.”
It included a parole board. Why? To save money — a long and enduring Virginia political impulse no less compelling than punishing criminals.
The “truth-in-sentencing” reforms of 1994 ended parole for
anyone convicted from that point forward and the number left eligible has dwindled ever since. Last year, it was roughly 2,900.
You just have to proceed with profound care, that’s the lesson of experience. The Parole Board must know that interested parties will parse adherence to every required procedure.
Fail to get the details right and you’re asking for it. You’re even inviting an inspector general, complete with opinions, to take notice.
After writing editorials for the Daily Press and The Virginian-Pilot in the 1980s, Gordon C. Morse wrote speeches for Gov. Gerald L. Baliles, then spent nearly three decades working on behalf of corporate and philanthropic organizations, including PepsiCo, CSX, Tribune Co., the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and Dominion Energy. His email address is gordonmorse @msn.com.