i started like a ritual i first, 1974, at the marion correctional institution is a teachers a. i was to pay ranges below a correctional officer when i started, and had some great experiences that i thank god i've been able to work in this profession. i had the opportunity at the age of 232 desegregating a prison, sell houses, programs and jobs. had the best job in the world for about 12 years in different places being a warden or superintendent were you can really enact change if your vision is right. most recently i've had the great opportunity to work with both the american correctional association unrestrictive housing or solitary confinement or what i wanted to say that i see a tremendous parallel between the struggle with putting too many people and restrictive housing and a prison system and each of mass incarceration i want to spend most of my time doing today. if you don't mind i want to start with a personal story. it's why i'm here today. it's very personal but it's why i am here. i retired from our department of rehabilitation and correction at the end of 2002 and i l

career july 1, 1974 at the marion correctional institute as a teacher's aide. s to pay ranges below a correctional officer when i started and i had some great experiences. that i have been able to work in this profession. i had the opportunity in 1983 of the segregating a prison -- desegregating a prison. i had the best job in the world for 12 years being a warning, or a superintendent where you can change the vision. i had the opportunity to both ask the and the american correctional association on solitary confinement. what i want to say with that is i see a tremendous parallel between the struggle with putting too many people in restrictive housing in prison systems and the issue of mass incarceration that i want to spend most of my time doing today. if you don't wind, i want to start with a personal story. it is why i am here today. it is very personal. it is why i am here. department of our rehabilitation and correction at the and of 2002 and i loved our system, i loved our career, i loved everything i did. but i retired. we did some work in the juvenile sy

remember, i started at the marion correctional institution, $2.54 an hour.finally, is your wife here? i said yes. they send somebody down to get in the. she is down in the soda room. when she walks in the eyes were big. i know she had more than one large soda. needs the governor and says, the governor shakes that hand and says linda, and i want gary in this job and we are going to do it this way. at that moment i had no intention to let moment of taking the job, none. the next thing he said is i want you to reform the most unreformed part of government. do it. we have dedicated since december 27th, 2010, talk about some of these things after i talk about what i consider to be the insanity of what we have talked about so far. let me talk -- we talked about prison, got to talk about this because it is important. from 1920 to 1975 our country, the united states of america had a very stable prison population, ran between 200,000, to 400,000, just under 500,000 for 55 years. adjusted with the population but 1975 was a dramatic increase that we saw. in fact, we ta

now, remember, i started at the marion correctional institute in 1974.s, is your wife here? and i said, yes. so they send someone down to get linda. she's still down in the soda room, right? [laughter] and so when she walks in, the eyes were big. i knew she'd had more than one large soda. [laughter] meets the governor and says, governor says, comes over, shakes linda's hand, says, linda, i want gary in this job. and we're going to do it his way with. and at that moment i had no intention until that moment of taking that job. none. none. and, folks, the next thing he said is, gary, i want you to reform the most unreformed part of government. do it. and we've dedicated, since december 27, 2010, to this. i'm going to talk about some of these things after i talk about what i consider to be the insanity of what we have talked about thus far. so let me just talk, we talked about -- i've got to talk about this before we do, because it's important. you know, from 1920 to 1975 our country, the united states of america, had a very stable prison population. it was,