The Office of the Auditor General for Michigan has released a new report on the Michigan Department of Corrections (DOC) system for transporting prisoners and the cost of that transportation, identifying problems with the procedures in place.
 
The conclusion of the report was that “DOC’s efforts to manage prisoner transportation costs were moderately effective.” But the report identified several key problems with controlling those costs. For example, the report found:

A. DOC has no standard procedures to account for and document prisoner transportation activity, which led to situations where such expenditures were misclassified.

B. DOC has failed to implement a central computer system to coordinate prisoner transportation efforts.

C. DOC has no central authority for coordinating the activities of the regional transportation hubs.

D. DOC has failed to take full advantage of technology like videoconferencing to reduce transportation costs by conducting long-distance court hearings and medical consultations.

E. Most importantly, that DOC had failed to fully implement the recommendations of the previous Auditor General’s report on the subject.

The report did note that the DOC had agreed with many of those findings and were working to implement the recommendations made. The DOC oversees 51 facilities around the state and is responsible for more than 51,000 prisoners. More than $23 million a year is spent on prisoner transportation.