The author believes in incarceration when there is a need and a purpose to it, i.e., when the offender is violent and cannot be managed in the community, or when the offender is nonviolent (e.g., drunk drivers) but has not responded to other forms of community intervention. However, in Canada, 80 percent of the correctional budget is spent on imprisoning offenders rather than funding alternative methods of corrections, despite the fact that two- thirds of convicted offenders spent less than 3 months in jail. The proposal presented here for dealing with nonviolent and non- threatening offenders would encompass the following components: no prison sentences in Canada less than 12-18 months, consolidation of 13 correctional jurisdictions under one prison system, and redirection of savings into school- and community-based crime prevention programs. 2 notes