Broadening access. Those on university campuses know the joys of high-speed Internet connection, but may go home, depending on where home is, to a connection that is irritatingly slow. Bringing broadband -- high-speed Internet connection -- to the majority of homes in the United States seems fraught with political and economic problems, but according to Laurence J. Kotlikoff, a CAS economics professor, the technology is now available that can let us have our broadband cake and eat it too.

Kotlikoff says that lower prices and widespread adoption of broadband by households and small businesses does not have to mean abandoning the Telecom Act of 1996 (TA96) and reestablishing the monopoly status of Bell Operating Companies (BOCs) in the hope that they will then invest in broadband infrastructure.

Instead, Kotlikoff suggests establishing electronic loop access (ELA). Loop refers to the local loop, the copper wire local telephone lines, telephone poles, underground conduits, and switches that connect the American public to the outside world. Access refers to allowing competitors to have the same physical and economically viable access to customers in providing local telephone and Internet service as the BOCs now enjoy, as well as allowing different BOC networks (data and voice) to use the physical loops. And electronic refers to the ability of a new technology to switch customers from one provider to another -- or between voice and data services of the same provider -- at the same extremely low costs, with the same speed and reliability as occurs in long distance service.

Kotlikoff points out that despite TA96, the BOCs have been able to maintain control of the local loop, restrict its use, and demand excessively high fees for local phone and Internet service. This is possible because the BOCs provide and maintain the local loop infrastructure -- wires, for instance, among others -- as well as sell voice and data transmission services. He makes the analogy to a local pizza delivery service that is given control of the streets in its neighborhood. It can then bar other pizza companies from using the street, raise the price it charges for pizza, and even keep other suppliers, such as the local Chinese take-out, from using the street and sell Chinese food as well as pizza at inflated prices.

By separating loop maintenance and transmission service, the way it is in long distance service, competition among service companies would drive down the price of broadband service. The technology to do this already exists, in the form of next generation digital remote terminals based on ATM (asynchronous transfer mode) switches, and according to Kotlikoff, the infrastructure needed to implement ELA is either already in place or slated to be installed. ELA, he says, “can transform the local loop from a bottleneck that restricts competition into a basin that attracts it. We need that competition and lots of it if the nation’s telecommunications industry is to continue to play its vital role in generating new investment, creating jobs, and propelling economic growth.”

Public safety? A recent article in the Boston Globe about homeless former prison inmates cited the case of Earl Brown, recently released from South Bay after serving two years for assault and battery. Brown left prison with little money and no place to call home, a common situation for former inmates. According to the Globe, “at least 1,000 inmates -- and possibly four times that number -- will leave a prison or jail this year and instantly become homeless.” The number of homeless former prisoners in Massachusetts has climbed steadily since 1992, when prerelease and halfway house programs were cut.

At that time, says Metropolitan College Professor Daniel LeClair, an expert in urban affairs, city planning, and criminal justice, Massachusetts joined a growing national trend toward retributive justice, shifting away from prison-based treatment, prerelease preparation, community-based reintegration, and parole supervision to emphasize secure custody of sentenced inmates. LeClair’s analysis of recidivism rates over the past 20 years, including data from more than 18,000 prison releases, is aimed at determining if the newer “get tough” policy has increased public safety.

In 1971 recidivism for all released prisoners was 25 percent. By 1973, a year after community reintegration programs were introduced, it had dropped to 19 percent, and by 1977 it reached a low of 15 percent, despite the fact that the 1975-76 crime rate was the highest in U.S. history. Significantly lower rates of recidivism were recorded for furlough participants than for nonparticipants and for inmates who participated in graduated reintegration programs -- moving progressively through institutions with lower levels of security.

LeClair attributes a subsequent increase in recidivism to restrictions on furloughs and other community-based integration programs. “ . . . by 1988, the year in which recidivism peaked at 31 percent, security level proportions had reversed and furlough participation declined dramatically. In that year the majority of the 3,446 released inmates (56 percent) were discharged directly from higher security.”

In 1992, after the Weld administration began cutting treatment, reintegration, and parole programs, reductions in the rate of recidivism again were documented. LeClair suggests that the lower figures are misleading and reflect the switch from paroled to general discharge releases. “When individuals are not paroled, they are eventually released with no community supervision by a parole office. As a result they cannot be returned to prison for violating release conditions, as is the case for supervised parolees. Instead they can only be returned to prison for more serious crimes, when an arrest results in a conviction and a new prison sentence.”

He argues that “the assumed gains of public safety achieved through extending the term of incarceration for high recidivism risk offenders may be outweighed once the offenders are released,” and he questions whether releasing prisoners without preparation, community support, and supervision makes us more, or less, safe.