Local law enforcement officials are urging residents to oppose a set of new regulations that could release about 1,200 prison inmates back into Ventura County communities within the next 18 months.

To reduce costs and overcrowding in state prisons, California legislators have decided to offer early release credits for inmates who complete educational and vocational programs, and to discontinue monitoring nonviolent offenders.

The new regulations went into effect Jan. 25.

The influx of newly released prisoners will produce more crime and exacerbate ongoing budget shortages and overpopulation in local jails, said Ventura County Sheriff Bob Brooks.

“They’re not fixing the problems; they’re just transporting problems to other jurisdictions that are not better equipped to handle them,” he said.

“We’re losing revenue to the state, and we’re getting hit from every angle,” Brooks said.

Under the new law, many offenders will no longer be subject to parole terms once they’re released. If they commit a new crime, they’ll have to be prosecuted again, making it likely they will face time in county jail rather than return to state prison.

“The key implication of that change is that parole terms are one of our major tools to deal with potentially violent gang members,” Brooks said. “It allows us to send them back to jail or prison before they hurt someone else.”

Statistically, 70 percent of former inmates are re-arrested because they commit new crimes and hurt new victims, the sheriff said.

“They will flood overcrowded jails and force the early release of other inmates,” Brooks said.

During his January budget pitch, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger also proposed reducing penalties for at least 11 crimes for which somebody can now be sent to state prison.

Crimes such as grand theft, auto theft, receiving stolen property and possession of methamphetamine for sale—once regular felonies—would be changed to “administrative felonies,” meaning the person being sentenced would receive one year in the county jail as opposed to two to four years in state prison.

In addition to creating more work for law enforcement agencies and overcrowding jails, the proposed measures will overload public health and social service agencies, Brooks said.

And many felons will rely on public assistance to meet their needs because they won’t be able to find work in today’s sluggish economy, he said.

Although he’s also apprehensive about the changes, Michael Schwartz, special assistant district attorney for Ventura County, said people shouldn’t be too alarmed.

“I don’t think there’s going to be an immediate release of thousands of inmates,” Schwartz said. “We’re still working to address the problem, but when we’re done, there will be fewer people in prison and more criminals on the street, and that’s a concern.”

According to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, discontinuing the monitoring of low-level offenders will improve the parole system by allowing parole agents to focus on the more serious offenders and reducing their caseloads.

Schwartz said the D.A. opposes the new policies because they’ll result in fewer parolees being returned to prison for violating probation.

“There could be a human cost. How do you put a price tag on a crime being committed against a victim that could have been prevented?” he asked.  

Nonetheless, Schwartz said, the Legislature and the governor had to make changes to reduce the prison population because, in addition to the necessity for cost-cutting, a prisoner release order issued by a federal court last August mandated that California must decrease its prison population by more than 40,000.

“We’ve got a federal court that has ruled that prisons are overcrowded and the population has to be reduced, so the state has to come up with a plan to accomplish that,” Schwartz said.

State legislators, district attorney’s offices and law enforcement officials challenged the release order in the U.S. Supreme Court last November.

The Supreme Court dismissed the petition on Jan. 19, but local officials said they aren’t giving up hope.

“The proposed legislations can still be blocked or amended,” said Brooks, urging residents to contact their elected representatives to ask them to retract the new regulations.

“Although tough cuts must be made, this is not the place to make them. There is still time for the Legislature to act. While it’s a reality that California has some monumental problems, the first responsibility of government is to protect citizens,” Brooks said.