Surprise: Two years after Louisiana lawmakers voted for longer sentences prison costs surge

Two years after Gov. Jeff Landry and state lawmakers voted to ensure people convicted of crimes serve more of their prison sentences, the governor’s staff says state incarceration expenses are surging. reported the Louisiana Illuminator.

Landry’s team presented a budget proposal Friday that includes an $82 million year-over-year increase in state funding for its corrections system, which pays for nine prisons as well as the parole and probation system. State spending on Louisiana State Penitentiary, the maximum security prison in Angola, would go up at least $17.5 million alone, according to Landry’s budget presentation.

The change equates to an 11% hike from current state funding in the corrections budget and would bring yearly state general funding spent on those services from $716.5 million to $798.2 million starting July 1.

Gary Westcott, secretary of the Department of Public Safety and Corrections, said some of the increase can be attributed to criminal sentencing changes Landry and the Louisiana Legislature have imposed.

At the beginning of his term in 2024, the governor called a special session for lawmakers to enact tough-on-crime legislation aimed at making sure people with criminal convictions spend more time in state prisons. One measure more than doubled the minimum amount of time people were required to stay incarcerated from 35% to 85% of their full prison sentence.

Another law change now limits people from having their prison stay fully reduced for the time they spend sitting in jail before they are convicted or plead guilty. Additionally, Landry and lawmakers abolished almost all access to parole and the number of people being released via parole has dropped to its lowest level in 20 years, according to ProPublica.

Critics of the new sentencing process expected it to increase the state’s prison population, which appears to be happening. Since Landry has taken office, the number of state inmates in Louisiana has grown by approximately 2,000 people to 30,100 overall, according to statistics on the corrections department’s website.

Angola’s prison population has gone up 426 people since 2024, according to the prison system. It now stands at 4,258, not including those being held in the federal immigration detention camp opened on the prison’s grounds last year.

The $17.5 million increase Landry has proposed for Angola’s budget next year includes a planned expansion separate from the immigration detainee camp. The governor wants to put 688 more state inmates on the sprawling 18,000-acre campus following the rehabilitation of older buildings on the grounds. The extra prisoners will require Angola to hire 150 more staff members.

In an interview, Westcott said many of the 688 additional people at Angola are expected to already be part of the state inmate population. They would normally be held as state prisoners in local jails, but those facilities are becoming overcrowded following Landry’s sentencing changes. Sheriffs are asking for state inmates to be moved from parish lockups into state facilities because they lack space to house them, Westcott said.

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