California gives people leaving prison just $200 to start over. After 50 years, that could change
A California lawmaker wants to increase the allowance that people released from prison receive to cover basic needs for the first time in nearly 50 years.
Sydney Kamlager, a state senator representing Los Angeles, is introducing legislation Friday to bump up the “gate money” – funds that people released from state prisons are given – from $200 to nearly $2,600.
“This is really about making sure that when people get out, we are not perpetuating a cycle of economic violence,” said Kamlager, whose office exclusively shared with the Guardian plans to introduce the new bill. “We have got to stop legislating poverty.”
This is the first major effort to increase gate money in recent memory. The roughly 600,000 people released from federal and state prisons each year are usually offered a pittance – if anything – to buy a bus ticket home, or a first meal, clothing and toiletries. California currently provides a debit card loaded with at most $200, though people serving short sentences receive even less. It already offers more than other states, an investigation by the Marshall Project found. Colorado, Texas, Florida and some other states provide $100 and Louisiana and Alabama offer just $10.