You might remember a Clint Eastwood movie from the 1970s titled “Escape From Alcatraz.”
But even Alcatraz, the famed federal prison on an island in San Francisco Bay, won’t escape the wasteful spending in the $862 billion federal “stimulus” program.
Stimulus dollars are being used to “decorate” the prison and its laundry building with nearly 1,400 solar panels. Preliminary guesstimates are that the renovation will cost up to $3 million.
And for what? Even that massive number of solar panels will produce only about half the energy needed by the prison, which is now a tourist site.
Worse yet, nearly 500 of the solar panels will be visible to the island’s 1 million annual visitors. While the prison and laundry building at Alcatraz are not noted for their architectural beauty, hundreds of dark-blue solar panels dotting the facilities surely will detract from the site’s imposing appearance and mar tourists’ enjoyment.