Put them to work

The juxtaposition of two stories on the Dec. 22 front page was not lost on this reader. Although both are complex problems and beg immediate, independent attention, perhaps there is a mutual solution of sorts. Review the facts in the articles about the decision by the mayor to cease sparring with the tax-exempt community over the city's pension debacle ("Mayor Drops Tuition Tax"), and the state's decision to outsource the incarceration of 2,000 inmates ("State Will Transfer 2,000 Inmates to Va., Mich.").

Pennsylvania taxpayers are now shouldering $1.8 billion annually to house a prison population from which we receive no tangible benefit. At the risk of drawing the ire of my liberal friends, I nevertheless submit that we might consider putting these folks to work in order that they might have an opportunity to repay their long overdue debt to the society they have injured. There is no shortage of opportunities for the application of good, honest and perhaps redemptive labor. Moreover, harnessing inmates to clean highways and plant trees would be new initiatives, and thereby not irritate my friends in organized labor.

The unfunded public pension liability crisis is not unique to this region, but a looming catastrophe facing the entire country. "Fixing it" will be very painful for a very long time and represent yet another public confiscation of private capital. But perhaps the medicine will not be as distasteful if we can enjoy a decent return from our growing "investment" in prisons.

LLOYD F. STAMY JR.
Fox Chapel