Support
The chief petitioners for Measure 61 were Kevin Mannix, Duane Fletchall and Steve Beck. Kevin Mannix said that Oregon's incarceration rate is below the national average and that the costs are high because of well-compensated corrections officers. "You get what you pay for", Mannix argued, adding that state prisons are among the most drug-free in the country.
Oregon prison officials questioned the Pew Center's numbers, mentioned below, and also pointed out that the Department of Corrections funnels about 20 percent of its budget directly to counties for jails and parole.
Loren Parks, the biggest political contributor in Oregon history, donated over $100,000 to the campaign for this measure.
Read more about this topic: Oregon Ballot Measure 61 (2008)
Famous quotes containing the word support:
“The interest in Wisdom is fading. Soon there will not be enough left to support the aphorism, even though it tries to amuse by half-mocking the Wisdom it propounds.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“The community and family networks which helped sustain earlier generations have become scarcer for growing numbers of young parents. Those who lack links to these traditional sources of support are hard-pressed to find other resources, given the emphasis in our society on providing treatment services, rather than preventive services and support for health maintenance and well-being.”
—Bernice Weissbourd (20th century)
“I concluded that I was skilled, however poorly, at only one thing: marriage. And so I set about the business of selling myself and two children to some unsuspecting man who might think me a desirable second-hand mate, a man of good means and disposition willing to support another man’s children in some semblance of the style to which they were accustomed. My heart was not in the chase, but I was tired and there was no alternative. I could not afford freedom.”
—Barbara Howar (b. 1934)