A concerned citizen

I am hoping that someone can give me more information regarding the program that uses inmates to clean up the city. First of all, let me say that I am in favor of this program when taken at face value. I think it is a great use of time to have inmates clean up the city streets. However, whenever I woke up this morning, the inmates were cleaning the street in my neighborhood. I live in an area that has been having an issue with robbery for the past few months. We have banded together as a neighborhood and the incidents have gone down. So I guess I need some helping in understanding why on earth inmates are brought into neighborhoods! Does anyone know what type of criminals are eligible for this program? I am assuming that is fairly low level crimes, however they have still commited a crime. As I was leaving for work this morning, the inmates were directly in front of my house and staring at me like there is no tomorrow. One of them was also checking out a friend's vehicle that was parked on the street. Does car theft qualify as one of those low level crimes that make the inmate eligible for the program? I will be having a child in a few months and do not think that I would appreciate if my child was playing outside while the inmates cleaned the street. We normally have a street sweeper that passes to clean the street, so why is the choice made to use inmate labor instead? I think this is a terrible idea. It gives inmates the opportunity to check out the neighborhood (potential robberies), look at the vehicles (potential car theft), and most importantly see who we are and were we live. Normally is someone seem out of place in our neighborhood, we make a point to question that person and pass the information along to one another. This program not only let the convicted criminals into the neighborhood with a legitmate excuse to be there, but gives them the opportunity to slowly inspect our lives! 

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