TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) Kansas spent at least $414,000 repairing damage and replacing equipment after inmate riots at three prisons in 2017 and 2018, corrections officials reported, surprising some state lawmakers Tuesday with the amount of expenses.
The figures represented the first attempt by the state Department of Corrections to calculate for legislators the cost of the damage from four major disturbances.
That amount is startling to me, said Sen. Rick Billinger, a Goodland Republican and chairman of a Senate budget subcommittee on corrections, whose district includes a low-security prison in Norton where a 2017 riot occurred. Its concerning any time theres damage done and were having to use taxpayer dollars to do the repairs.
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