EDITORIAL DO THE TIME MONEY IS NO EXCUSE FOR RELEASING CRIMINALS EARLY FROM JAIL.

MEMBERS of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors and Sheriff Lee Baca keep pointing fingers at each other over budget cuts, even as our streets become more dangerous because of the revolving door in county jails.

For three years, Baca has run a catch-and-release program in the county jail system, letting inmates out after serving as little as 10 percent of their sentences. The effect has been a get-out-of-jail-free card for L.A. criminals, and the criminals have taken notice.

In January, Joshua Vick - an inmate granted an early release - was arrested on suspicion of killing his parents and his ex-girlfriend. That follows another incident from last April, when fellow early-releasee Manuel Castenado Banos allegedly beat a woman to death with a hammer.

These are, to be sure, extreme and isolated cases, but common sense suggests that meaningless, symbolic jail terms are no way to run a criminal justice system. They eliminate a key deterrent against crime, and waste millions in legal expenses as the same people are arrested and tried, again and again.

The reason for the early releases, according to Baca, is that he lacked the funds to hold inmates any longer. Of course, Baca was pushing for an initiative on last November's ballot that would have raised county sales taxes to hire more cops and deputies - a campaign for which his highly publicized releases served as a handy prop.

Supervisors Gloria Molina and Zev Yaroslavsky claim that, contrary to all his protesting, Baca had plenty of money to run the jails. They note that they gave the Sheriff's Department $30.5 million in supplemental funds last year, and that the department ended the year with a $45 million surplus.

The real problem, the supervisors suspect, is that Baca has shifted money away from jails to patrols and detectives. Baca's supporters, meanwhile, criticize the supervisors for past funding cuts.

But there's plenty of blame to go around. The board, which had a $309 million surplus last year, gave only a fraction of that to the department - perhaps thinking that shortchanging cops would be a good way to sell the public on its bond initiative. And it's widely recognized that the department loses money by not charging contract cities enough for its services.

Fiscal mismanagement is everywhere, but it's no excuse for letting criminals out of jail. It's time for Baca to end the early-release program, which makes a mockery of our legal system and imperils our neighborhoods.