NY candidate: Prison dorms for welfare recipients
That said, this suggestion made by a Republican candidate for governor in New York to turn NY PRISONS into dormitories for welfare recipients to receive training is absolutely ridiculous. Even though the plan may be “voluntary,” I can see how this will play out. Of course, drawing from the given big time to drug addicts, small time dealers, pot heads, and with 3-strikes laws petty criminals are doing hard time. Now, “voluntarily” send welfare recipients to jail. This sounds more like something someone would whisper as a bad joke while hunting in the woods, not a campaign platform. That’s scary. And to think this will have an impact on illegal immigration. How about using those jails to lock up illegal immigrants? The are breaking the law. This is just foolish!
By Beth Fouhy (AP) – NEW YORK — Republican candidate for governor Carl Paladino said he would transform some New York prisons into dormitories for welfare recipients, where they could work in state-sponsored jobs, get employment training and take lessons in “personal hygiene.”
Paladino, a wealthy Buffalo real estate developer popular with many tea party activists, isn’t saying the state should jail poor people: The program would be voluntary.
But the suggestion that poor families would be better off in remote institutions, rather than among friends and family in their own neighborhoods, struck some anti-poverty activists as insulting.
Paladino is competing for the Republican nomination with former U.S. Rep. Rick Lazio. The primary is Sept. 14.
Paladino first described the idea in June at a meeting of The Journal News of White Plains and spoke about it again this week with The Associated Press.
Throughout his campaign, Paladino has criticized New York’s rich menu of social service benefits, which he says encourages illegal immigrants and needy people to live in the state. He has promised a 20 percent reduction in the state budget and a 10 percent income tax cut if elected. Read the full story here