The Department of Corrections says in order to function they need about $580 million for the next fiscal year. That's not even including a request for a bond of more than $300 million dollars. With constant underfunding during even good budget years, it's left the D.O.C. with no choice but to beg. "I say begging because that's where I'm at," says Lt. William Weldon with Joseph Harp Correctional Center. "I'm begging for assistance. I'm asking for help. Someone's got to do something…"

The issue surfaced late last year after Corrections Corporation of America requested a 5 percent increase in daily per-prisoner payments from the state for each year of the next decade. The company operates five private prisons in Colorado and has said it will have to clear inmates out of one of them if it does not receive more money. With Colorado's 23 publicly owned prisons filled almost to capacity - three of them with doublebunked beds in many cells - and with CCA housing 19.4 percent of Colorado inmates, legislators find themselves in a bind…

Committee work sessions got under way in earnest at the Maine State House on Monday on a still-developing new plan to integrate the county jail network with the state prison system. As outlined thus far, a new board appointed by the governor would oversee an integrated system of county jails and state prisons. The board would look at budgets and expenditure trends. The state would be expected to pick up debt service burdening counties now…

Public sector prisons are out-performing their privately-run counterparts, claims a leaked document from the Prison Service. The report, which includes an internal league table ranking all jails in England and Wales, allegedly shows a gap between the performance of prisons run by private companies and those under state control…

Supervisors are worried about increased costs for jails, courts and the sheriff in a county that has had its own jail crowding problems. "We need to send a message loud and clear that we will not accept prisoners back into the county," Supervisor Henry Perea said. "At some point the bad guys are going to figure out there's no consequences," he added. "That's not good for the county…"

During a meeting yesterday at the Lexington Assessment and Reception Center, the state Board of Corrections learned that inmates now can call anywhere in the nation for a charge of about $3.60 for a 15-minute call, with no connection fee. DOC spokesman Jerry Massie says that before the change, such a call cost about $7 with a connection fee…

A state lawmaker wants to levy a $2-a-day fee for prisoners imported from other states to private prisons in Oklahoma. Rep. Brian Renegar, D-McAlester, said there are 4,375 out-of-state inmates now imprisoned in Oklahoma. Renegar said the inmates come at a cost to taxpayers for food stamps and other benefits paid to families of inmates relocated to the state…

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is considering the early release of more than 20,000 low-risk prison inmates as a way to save money amid a worsening budget crisis, a newspaper [The Sacramento Bee - article since removed] reported Thursday. The governor's office told The Associated Press that Schwarzenegger had not decided to release inmates early and that it was premature to say he would propose it to lawmakers when he releases his budget in January…

Jo Ann Gordon, 59, has seen it all during her 31-year career in the California Department of Corrections. Her book, "The Road Goes Both Ways: A Collection of Short Stories," was published earlier this year, and it shares some of the tales she has cultivated through the years…