From 2020 to 2025, the number of confirmed overdose deaths in Texas prisons rose from just four to at least 131. Despite this surge in fatalities, however, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) did not request any additional funding to expand its drug rehabilitation programs in its recent proposed budget to the Texas Legislature ahead of next year’s session.
Instead, the agency asked lawmakers to “maintain current funding levels for rehabilitation and reentry programs such as chaplaincy, reentry transitional coordinators, substance use treatment programs, and the sex offender treatment program” for 2028-29. If that request is granted, funding for these programs would in fact effectively decline due to rising inflation. Further, the same programming is set to be affected by a mandated 3 percent reduction in spending across state departments, though TDCJ has asked for that cut to be reversed.
