The Woman’s Reformatory Commission of New Jersey has decided to ask
the legislature to appropriate $200,000 to carry out the provisions of
a law enacted in 1910 by which such a reformatory is established and
its organization and administration provided for. This appropriation
will be sufficient to secure a site and to erect the necessary
buildings, consisting of six cottages to accommodate from twenty-five
to thirty each, their estimated cost with equipment being $25,000
each. The site is to be in the country, approximately two hundred
acres, which with necessary administrative and other buildings will
cost $30,000. For sewage disposal $15,000 will be needed, and $5,000
will be necessary for preliminary expenses.
A census of women who were serving sentences in penal and reformatory
institutions in New Jersey on the first of November last, including
girls over sixteen years of age at the state home for girls at
Trenton, numbered 336; the number between sixteen and thirty years of
age was 210.
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A definite move has been made in Michigan legislature looking to the
treatment of habitual drunkenness on farms provided by the state. A
bill directing the governor to appoint a commission of five to
investigate the subject of farm colonies for inebriates and other
minor offenders who at present are confined in jails has been
introduced by Senator George G. Scott of Detroit. The commission is
authorized to extend its investigations to methods in force in foreign
countries as well as this. The report will be made to the next
legislators.