A new report estimates that inmates and their families spend $15 million annually to stay in touch with one another, with most of that cost being borne by their loved ones in prison.

This means that inmates, who receive extremely low daily wages, often cannot afford to stay in touch with their support system due to the exorbitant fees charged by two companies that control prison communications, according to the report released Monday by the progressive think tank New Jersey Policy Perspective.

“Realistically, when you consider an inmate’s salary, they can’t afford to have a relationship. Especially when it’s a parent trying to communicate with their child, you can’t afford to talk to someone as often as you’d like,” said Marleina Ubel, the group’s senior policy analyst. “It’s just not possible.”

The new report comes four months after a report by the state Department of Corrections Ombudsman said the Department of Corrections had revoked telephone privileges for thousands of inmates as punishment for disciplinary violations, sometimes for a year or significantly longer.

To communicate with the outside world, inmates use ViaPath for phone calls and JPay for video calls and emails. Phone calls cost about 4 cents per minute, or about 60 cents for 15 minutes; video calls cost about 33 cents per minute, or $9.95 for 30 minutes; and electronic messages cost about 35 cents per credit, or 70 cents for a message with a photo. The low-tech tablets sold by JPay also cost about $50.

These are “extraordinarily expensive” for the inmates, said Ubel. Sometimes people spend their entire day’s wages just to receive an email with an attached photo, she added.

Incarcerated workers earn between $1.60 and $7.50 per day of work. Most earn between $1.60 and $3 on average, according to data from the New Jersey Department of Corrections that the group examined.

Prison inmates don’t just pay for phone calls. They also buy things at the grocery store, pay child support, or need money to pay for medication. As a result, most costs are borne by family members, disproportionately women of color, the report says. And one in three inmate families or support organizations go into debt to pay for communications, the report says.

New Jersey has the greatest disparity between blacks and whites in prisons in the country: Blacks make up about 60 percent of the prison population and whites about 20 percent, according to the Prison Policy Initiative, a nationwide organization that tracks incarceration rates.

“There are people who are already economically vulnerable for various reasons and are now trying to pay the fees that these private companies charge just to ensure that their children can communicate with their parents,” Ubel said.

According to Ubel, this is generating hundreds of millions of dollars in profits for these companies that have monopolized prison communications. Statewide, JPay earned $1.7 million from electronic messaging and video calls in 2023, and ViaPath generated more than $4.8 million in revenue from state and county prisons.

Daniel Sperrazza, a spokesman for the Department of Corrections, said of the $15 million spent on calls, videos and emails, about $7.6 million went to state prisons.

Sperrazza said the state recognizes the positive benefits for inmates of having contact with their loved ones. The department has made communication more affordable and accessible, including by phasing out commissions charged by the state and reducing fees for various services, he said.

“New Jersey has one of the lowest rates in the country for phone calls to prison inmates, and negotiations are underway with a new provider to further expand and improve access to phone calls, video visits and other multimedia messages,” Sperrazza said.

Ubel said the state could eliminate all fees for calls and emails.

“We can make this communication free for inmates and their families. Frankly, sending an email should not cost anything,” she said.

Monday’s report indicates that $15 million represents just over 1 percent of the Department of Corrections’ $1.2 billion budget.

A bill in the state legislature would require all adult and juvenile correctional facilities, county jails and private prisons to allow inmates to make and receive phone calls, video calls and emails, at no cost to the sender and the recipient.

Under the bill, the costs would be passed on to the operator of the correctional facility. Other states, including Connecticut, California, Minnesota and Massachusetts, as well as New York City, have already moved to similar models.

Senator Brian Stack (D-Hudson) is sponsoring the bill in the Senate and Representative Carmen Theresa Morales (D-Essex) is sponsoring it in the House.

“Maintaining contact with family and the community during detention is crucial for successful reintegration. Therefore, it is in the public interest to reduce the economic burden on incarcerated persons of making and receiving calls and messages,” the bill states.

The bill introduced in February has not yet been discussed in the committees of both chambers.