Asm. Schaer: New Jersey ready for geriatric parole law

It is estimated that by 2030, more than a third of the country’s prison population will be people 55 and older. In 2023, the New Jersey Department of Corrections reported that 1,026 people in New Jersey prisons – or 8% – were over 60 years old.

As seniors face an increased risk of health problems leading to costly healthcare bills, prisons should make updates such as increased staffing, additional intensive training to properly assist seniors and updates to facilities such as guardrails and ramps. All this would come at the expense of taxpayers.

The burden on taxpayers for incarcerating individuals is high. On average, providing care and housing costs $74,000 per year for each individual in a New Jersey state prison. The cost of caring for older incarcerated people is three to nine times higher per inmate than that of younger people. Because incarcerated people are not eligible for Medicare, this forces the state and taxpayers to cover medical costs.

To solve this problem, the state could reduce its budget by about $3 million to $7 million simply by granting parole to elderly and infirm incarcerated people.

This year, I introduced Assembly Bill A-2902, which allows individuals 65 or older who have served at least a third of their sentence – and individuals over 60 who have served half of their sentence – to request parole. Under this legislation, people serving time for the most serious crimes – such as murder, manslaughter, kidnapping, second-degree arson, terrorism, sexual assault, endangering the welfare of a child or armed robbery – would not be eligible.

New Jersey would join 17 other states, including Georgia and Maryland, in enacting geriatric parole laws. In recent years, our state has advocated for prison reform through laws such as the Compassionate Release Act (2021) and the Earn Your Way Out Act (2020). These laws respectively create medical parole and expedite the parole eligibility process for non-violent offenders through a rehabilitation program.

As James McGreevey, executive director of the New Jersey Reentry Corporation, noted: “Older adults are a rapidly growing cohort of the nation’s prison population. According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, between 1999 and 2007, the number of people age 55 or older incarcerated in state and federal prisons increased by 76.9 percent. Geriatric release is a sensible and ethical policy that allows elderly inmates to live out the remaining years of their lives outside of prison. Allowing elderly inmates in our state prisons to petition for release due to their advanced age is a just and moral step our state should take. »

Because older adults are unlikely to reoffend after release, incarcerated individuals can focus their rehabilitation efforts on education, job training, and mentoring to prepare for life after incarceration and combat recidivism.

The United States Sentencing Commission reports that the re-incarceration rate for people 65 or older is about 4 percent. By saving taxpayers millions of dollars in health care, those funds could instead be used to reduce recidivism.

Incarcerated older adults do not pose a threat to society’s public safety. As they suffer from a variety of age-related health problems, the results show they pose little or no risk if re-incarcerated. Many incarcerated seniors have often been incarcerated since the war on drugs and the war on crime were important aspects of the prison system – outdated systems put in place in the late 1960s.

Additionally, these older incarcerated individuals are currently serving sentences dating back to when mandatory minimums were common. The New Jersey Department of Corrections estimates that 76.8 percent of all incarcerated people in the state are currently serving a mandatory minimum sentence.

According to the 2023 New Jersey Criminal Sentencing Report, up to 300 incarcerated people would be eligible for parole if geriatric parole is enacted into law. It is essential to implement reform of the incarceration system in New Jersey. A2902 is not only compassionate to incarcerated elderly people, but it also eases the tax burden on taxpayers.

Assemblyman Gary Schaer has represented the 36th Legislative District in Bergen and Passaic Counties since 2006.

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