Texas jails cut weekend lunches

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AUSTIN, Texas, Oct. 22 (UPI) -- Texas has begun serving prisoners in short-term institutions only two meals a day on weekends to cut costs, a Department of Criminal Justice spokesman says.

Jason Clark told CNNMoney that jails where inmates serve sentences of no more than two years provide a brunch served between 5 a.m. and 7 a.m. and dinner from 4 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. He said inmates with special diets prescribed by doctors are exempt.

"The brunch and dinner meals provide the same number of servings of each food group as is served during the week, but those servings are distributed over two meals instead of three," Clark said in an e-mail.

The policy began in April.

Lisa Graybill, director of the Texas American Civil Liberties Union, said that if the state really wants to save money on its prisons it should put fewer people behind bars.