What The Heck Were They Paying For?

One of the most common arguments in favor of privatizing prisons (granted, it usually comes from the privateers themselves, but that's not the point) is that they generate cost savings for financially-strapped governments looking to manage more prisoners than they have capacity for.  More often than not, the cost savings they generate come from cutting corners in things like medical care, maintenance of the facilities, staffing (and training of staff), and programming.

It turns out however that even all these reductions in services aren't enough for the private prison industry to save money in New Mexico.  The state has decided to remove 114 prisoners from private prisons and transfer them back to state-run facilities.  This move will save them approximately $2.1 million over the next year, or more than $18,000 per prisoner.  So for nearly $20,000 per prisoner per year LESS than what private prisons charge, New Mexico can incarcerate its own citizens.

Or alternatively, New Mexico has been overpaying its private prison operators by millions upon millions of dollars for years.  Whichever way you slice it, the private prison industry is a scam.

A Smart Investment

No, I'm not going to begin telling you that investing in private prisons is a good idea.  Don't worry.  Rather, the title is a reference to the investment(s) CCA has made in itself in the form of political contributions.  I have, on occasion, mentioned how CCA, the GEO Group, and other private prison operators lobby the federal government and cultivate political relationships through campaign contributions (For more on that, see pretty much every entry I've ever done on here).  Those contributions help to ensure these companies continue to secure contracts with state and federal governments to operate correctional facilities.

It turns out the money they invested in these political relationships have really paid off.  A recent report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which audits government contracts, found that CCA took in more than $800 million in contracts last year.  They were able to make all this money despite the fact that they have been cited for numerous safety violations and circumventing labor laws.  So you can feel confident knowing that your tax dollars are being funnelled to a corporation that repeatedly violates the terms of its contracts, fails to maintain safe facilities, and doesn't see the need to follow labor regulations.  Great.

Mass Incarceration and Profiteering

Diversity, Inc. has come out with two fantastic articles that detail how the private prison industry has helped contribute to the US far and away leading the world in its rate of incarceration.  We lock up more than one out of every 100 adults in this country, and more than 1 out of every 31 are in prison, or on probation or parole.  We have more people in prison, in both real numbers and percentage-wise, than Russia, North Korea, Iraq, or any other country in the world.  We have over 1 million more people in prison than China, despite the fact that they have more than 4 times our population.  And all this amidst the fact that rates of crime are actually dropping across the country.  So what happened?

The private prison industry happened.  After it was nearly crushed out, for a second time, in the late 90s following a series of abuses, lawsuits, and mismanagement, the industry was resurrected (largely) by the immigration detention boom that took place over the past decade and a half.  After CCA and GEO had worked through the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) to increase penalties for repeat felons and drug offenders in the 80s and 90s, in the late 90s and early 2000s they began to focus on immigration.  Both companies lobby the federal government and state governments, to the tune of tens of millions of dollars, on immigration issues.  Additionally, both work with ALEC to promote and pass model legislation like SB1070, which guarantees them a steady flow of more and more prisoners for their beds.  The other article on Diversity, Inc. delves much deeper into the connections each company has with ALEC, and how they have used this conservative front group to promote their anti-American agenda.  (Yes, it's anti-American, because they're trying to incarcerate as many of us as possible, regardless of whether its sensible or moral to do so.)

As today's title link points out, the privateers exploited the poor planning of government agencies who passed tough-on-crime legislation but failed to build enough prison beds to handle the added capacity.  Able to design and build facilities in half the time it takes the government, using private funds, CCA and GEO capitalized on a market that had a high demand and very little supply.  As CCA's CEO readily admits, they want to continue to exploit those decisions in the future: "we have the salespeople and lobbyists pitching the benefits of privatization to the governors and legislators... they wake up one day and they don't have beds and will have to turn to the private sector." 

Unfortunately, private prison companies, especially CCA and the GEO group, have a tremendous foothold on the industry, especially in immigration detention.  By cultivating relationships with tough-on-crime and pro-business politicians, they have all but ensured their continued survival, and thriving, despite the fact that they have each established independent track records of negligence, abuse, contract noncompliance, and malfeasance.  Simply put, there is no place in our criminal justice system that should lend itself to someone making a profit, especially the incarceration of American citizens.  It's a sick, sick world out there.

The Criminalization of Immigrants

Peter Cervantes-Gautchi, a writer for the Americas Program at the Center for International Policy, has written a fantastic and scathing report on how corporate interests have dominated the immigration debate in this country, and how that has paid dividends for CCA and GEO, who have both profited tremendously off America's rush to incarcerate illegal immigrants.  This article is really just amazing; it explains how major corporations have invested in the tycoon companies, and how the companies have manipulated politicians (who often have a personal stake in the issue) to ensure they continue to get contracts despite the fact that they can't operate a prison humanely or efficiently.  He really knocks it out of the park with this one.

Favoritism

Corrections Corporation of America, CCA, is based in Nashville, Tennessee.  They also happen to have a lot of friends in the government in Tennessee, relationships that have been cultivated through lobbying and campaign contributions.  CCA very nearly had its former chief counsel appointed as a federal district judge in Tennessee, but thanks to a fantastic public education campaign by Alex Friedmann and the Private Corrections Institute, that nomination was thwarted.  However, they still have tremendous pull within both local and state governments in Tennessee (as well as a lot of other places),  In fact, CCA is so friendly with the state government that they were able to secure a 10% increase in the per diem rate they are paid to house Tennessee prisoners, while the state decided to release low-risk inmates from county jails due to cost.  It actually costs the state more money to house prisoners in the CCA facilities in the state than they are charged by many counties.  Henderson county in particular charges the state nearly $13 per prisoner, per day less than CCA does.  They charge the federal government $7 per prisoner per day less than CCA.  Yet the state is sending more prisoners to private prisons.  Something smells awfully fishy in Tennessee.

Ballsy

CCA has decided to sue Hernando County, Florida for the payments the county has withheld from them that would cover the last few months of the contract they bailed out of.  Hernando has withheld $1.8 million or so in payment to CCA while a team of experts is inspecting the jail to determine the extent of the damage done to the facility by CCA's failure to properly maintain it.  Thankfully, the county has held firm and won't pay CCA, which is a good thing, because....

In further news, the facility needs 15 EFFING MILLION DOLLARS worth of repairs and work.  It needs not only maintainenance, but upgrades to meet building code and security standards, all of which CCA neglected to do.

Peter Shumlin for Governor! (of Vermont)

Peter Shumlin, a Senator from Vermont, is running for Governor.  He has vowed to cancel the state's contract with CCA and bring Vermont's inmates home:

"Currently almost 700 inmates are housed in private, out-of-state prisons owned by the Corrections Corporation of America. This contract costs taxpayers roughly $18 million a year and poses a threat to public safety when inmates return more dangerous after mixing with populations in other states. The CCA contract will be terminated if Peter is elected."

Sweet.

This link goes to a financial news website called The Street, which has an article about the future prospects for CCA and GEO stock.  The article properly points out that violent crime, along with the prison population, has declined over the past year.  The author speculates that this will adversely impact CCA's and GEO's business as states will have less of a need for new prison beds in the future.  But the icing on the cake is that both CCA and GEO have lost a great deal of value in their company stock.  CCA's stock is down 6.6% this year, and 17% over the past 3 years.  GEO is down an amazing 26% over the past 3 years.  All of this is great news.

Arizona is Indeed Seeking More Private Beds

Arizona just re-issued a request for proposals (RFP) for 5,000 new private prison beds.  Instead of following national trends towards reforming parole/probation, de-prioritizing drug prosecution, and increasing alternatives to confinement that have reduced prison populations in places like Texas and New York, they have just decided to solicit more prison beds.  This is the second RFP they have put out this year (after they tried unsuccessfully to sell then lease back the state government building.  Seriously.); the first was cancelled shortly after the escapes from the Kingman prison, amid the public perception that "hey, maybe private prisons aren't all they're cracked up to be."

This new RFP is slightly revised, and contains more stringent regulations on the oversight of the potential contract.  It has stronger enforcement mechanisms for non-compliance (meaning the government will be able to asses stronger penalties), stricter reporting requirements, and more formalized auditing procedures.  So basically whichever company wins the bid will be subject to greater oversight due to MTC's failure to maintain a secure facility.   While I am still adamantly opposed to increasing the amount of private prison beds, at least any beds that come about in response to this RFP will be better-regulated than the private prisons currently being operated in the state (in theory, anyway.).

Political Favors Reveal Lack of Oversight

I wrote in the past about how the Secretary of Corrections for the state of New Mexico, Joe Williams, declined to enforce penalties against CCA and GEO for contract non-compliance in the form of ongoing staff vacancies.  Mr. Williams was employed by the GEO Group for years prior to joining Gov. Richardson's cabinet, and apparently decided that consistent failures to abide by the contracts they have with the state on the part of CCA and GEO didn't warrant fines.  Well it turns out that Mr. Williams probably cost his state close to $20 million in uncollected penalties (which would be awfully nice to receive in this era of fiscal restraint and tight budgets).  But what is even more troubling is that that amount can't be verified because the Department of Corrections isn't even sure about how long the positions were vacant.

That's right; the government agency charged with overseeing private prisons in New Mexico can't provide oversight because they don't have access to the information.  "We do not have adequate records to demonstrate how long some correctional officer positions remained vacant,” corrections spokeswoman Tia Bland said.  Aside from the public's inability to access information about private prisons, it is preposterous to think that the government agency charged with overseeing a private company's responsibility to incarcerate prisoners is incapable of doing so because it can't access the information. 

Private prisons must be subject to stricter oversight.

Failure of Oversight

Arizona's Department of Corrections had an employee specifically designated to provide oversight of the operations of the Kingman prison, the facility from which 3 inmates (2 of them convicted murderers) escaped in Juyl, leading to a huge headline-grabbing manhunt.  But it turns out he was so overwhelmed with paperwork that he wasn't able to properly monitor the security or operations of the prison.  He had not even read the contract the state had with MTC to operate the facility in over 14 months on the job.  He knew nothing of the alarm system that had not been maintained in over 2 years since MTC's contract with the vendor expired.  The prison would go months between inspections, which were done so poorly they weren't able to identify the problems that lingered at the prison for years.

Private prison proponents love to point out that the facilities are most often monitored by an employee, or handful of employees, in state governments that ensure contract compliance.  However, it's obvious that simply having a person designated to provide oversight of a private facility is not enough to ensure they will operate according to the contract, or that the company will maintain a safe and humane facility.  But private prison companies continually lobby against increased oversight of their facilities, in both state and federal governments.  They spend millions opposing legislation that would improve the public's access to their records, thereby increasing the amount of oversight on the industry. 

Considering the industry's track record of negligence and abuse, along with repeated failures to ensure compliance with the contracts they enter into at the expense of American taxpayers, private prison companies need to be held accountable to the public.  To borrow from Louis Brandeis, sunlight is the best disinfectant.  It is high time that the contract violations and human rights abuses that take place within the private prison industry are brought out into that light.

Tulsa, OK Saves Nearly $15 Million by De-Privatizing Jail

The sheriff of Tulsa, Oklahoma, has saved his town approximately $14 million over the past 5 years since he took over operations of the jail from CCA.  His initial budget proposal was $2 million cheaper than CCA's in 2006, so the county properly decided he should take over operations.  With some clever ideas to bring in new revenue streams and by improving efficiency, he has saved the taxpayers of Tulsa millions of dollars that would have otherwise gone into the pockets of CCA executives.

As the county's fiscal officer, Jim Smith, puts it:

"If CCA would have continued operating the jail, the Criminal Justice Authority would have been millions in the red by now."