Illinois Governor Pat Quinn insists the state prison system is NOT overcrowded.
There are about 49,000 inmates in facilities built for 32,000 people.
"I feel that the prisons of our state, and every other state frankly, are crowded. In Illinois we have an adequate number of beds to handle the inmates we have."
But Illinois spends 98% of its Corrections budget just housing the inmates, leaving little money for education or job training.
Quinn says he'd obviously like to bring down the prison population because it costs more than 20 thousand dollars a year to house each inmate.
Quinn made his comments in an hour-long interview on prisons Friday on WBEZ, Chicago Public Radio's Afternoon Shift program.
