Yesterday, the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker group that has been advocating against prison privatization in Arizona, released an extensive report reviewing the safety, quality, and cost of private prisons in Arizona—including 6 prisons operated by Corrections Corporation of America that do not contract with the state.  The report, Private Prisons:  The Public’s Problem,  is the first of its kind to be completed in Arizona, and reveals widespread and persistent problems in private facilities.

The report cites data showing that the private prisons under contract with the state cost more than equivalent units operated by the Department of Corrections.  The group estimates that in 2009 and 2010, Arizona overpaid for these units by as much as $7 million. If the state adds 2,000 medium-security private beds, Arizonans could be losing over $10 million every year on private prisons.

The report also reveals that all private prisons in Arizona for which security assessment information was available had serious security flaws:

• The Arizona Auditor General found a total of 157 security failures in the 5 private prisons under contract with the Arizona Department of Corrections, including malfunctioning cameras, doors, and alarms; holes under fences; broken perimeter lights and cameras; and inefficient or outright inept security practices across the board by state and private corrections officers and managers.
• California’s Inspector General found serious security flaws and improper treatment of California inmates held in three CCA prisons in Arizona.  Inspectors found flaws with the incident alarm-response systems at the three prisons because there was no audible alarm, and two were found to have malfunctioning and out-of-focus security cameras.
• AFSC found evidence of at least 28 riots in private prisons since 2009.  The number of riots is likely underreported.  AFSC also found evidence of as many as 33 other serious disturbances involving groups of prisoners classified under “refusal to obey,” “tampering with state property,” and “obstructing an officer.”  Some of these incidents involved as many as 10, 20 and even 50 prisoners.
• There were at least 6 escapes from inside Arizona private prisons in the past 10 years

AFSC is open-sourcing the supporting data used in the report.  Both the report and the documentation are available at:  http://afsc.org/arizona-prison-report.

You can see some of the coverage from yesterday’s press conferences here:

An excellent piece by Luis Carrion on Arizona Illustrated

Another great article by Bob Ortega at the Arizona Republic

By Guest Blogger Penny Pestle, ppestle@cox.net

Years and sometimes decades after ignoring safe and cost-effective sentencing reform in states across the country, Arizona’s politicians and prosecutors are afraid…very afraid.  They fear changes they should have made a long time ago.

Last year, Judiciary chairs Rep. Farnworth and Sen. Gould out-and-out refused to allow any sentencing reform bills to be heard in their committees. It’s the legislative equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling, “LA-LA, CAN’T HEAR YOU!”

And just a couple of weeks ago, Arizona criminal prosecutors published a 514-page hysterical rant about how everybody in prison in Arizona is dangerous and the system is working just fine, thank you.  Oh, and our harsh sentencing laws are responsible for the drop in crime rates.  Sure.  Right.

A little background–

Starting in the late 70s, drug offenses were criminalized like never before and prisons across the country, including Arizona, began to grow…and grow.

In the 1990s, in their infinite wisdom, criminal justice policy-makers in Arizona became even tougher on crime. The Arizona legislature implemented mandatory sentencing, requiring that judges follow specific guidelines.  They also put into place truth-in-sentencing, better called “you must serve at least 85% of your sentence, regardless of good behavior, advanced age, incurable disease or other common-sense reasons for reducing sentences.”

Not surprisingly, in the 30 years from 1980 to 2010, Arizona’s population doubled; during that same time, our prisons grew ten-fold.  Our costs to incarcerate nearly 40,000 people have increased dramatically.  This growth has  encouraged ever more rapacious private prison companies to put the pressure on politicians, whose campaigns they help fund, to support more private prisons.

Fast forward to FY 2012.
Prison costs represent 11% of Arizona’s general fund expenditures.  The Department of Corrections is the only state department to increase their budget. All this while children’s health care, K-12 education, higher education and a myriad of social programs are slashed.

The handwriting is on the wall…something’s gotta give and that something is the cost of corrections and the number of people on prison.  So, in the 2011 session, Arizona’s legislators hit on the idea of cost-shifting to the counties, by passing a law that all prisoners with less than a year will serve their time in county jails.  Only the notorious Sheriffs Arpaio of Maricopa County and Babeu of Pinal County like this idea…because it increases their power. Pretty much all other county officials hate the idea and it looks like the law will be revoked.

What can right-minded policy-makers do?  They can follow the lead of “Right on Crime”, the unlikely sentencing reform movement of conservative luminaries.  Their ranks include Grover Norquist, William Bennett, Jeb Bush and the ever-popular Newt Gingrich.  These men are simply following the lead of numerous red states that have followed the lead of progressive states who have wised up to sensible sentencing reform.

So back to why politicians and prosecutors are afraid of sentencing reform?

They are afraid to admit that highly-touted policies aren’t working.  They are afraid that constituents will think they are soft-on-crime, even though sensible reform has succeeded in conservative states and is producing documented results. They fear losing power.  Under our current structure, the prosecutors hold all the chips and call the shots.  They don’t want to give back power back to judges–the judiciary is not popular among conservative legislators and their cronies.

Hard evidence of this fear includes the massive report commissioned by APAAC, the professional association and mouthpiece for prosecutors. This report is a rehash of a shorter and equally misleading report APAAC commissioned last year which uses hundreds of pages of analyses, graphs, statistics, and trend lines to reinforce the idea that prisons hold many people who are prone to violence and that the status quo is dandy.

To paraphrase Shakespeare:  the prosecutors doth protest too much.

As for the legislature, so far it appears that  Ron Gould, Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and his counterpart in the State House,  Eddie Farnsworth, are assuming the same stance as last year, refusing to hear sentencing reform bills.  If they don’t like a bill, they don’t have to vote for it.  But keeping it from being heard is nothing more than cowardly political bullying.  These legislators are elected to act in the best interest of the people of Arizona, not special interest groups like prosecutors or private prison corporations.

Let’s hope that our state moves into the 21st century and its criminal justice leadership–prosecutors and legislators–wise up to what they should be doing!  A number of sentencing reform bills have been introduced in this session; we’ll be writing more about them in the future:  stay tuned.

It’s been a hot summer in Arizona, but there were a lot of private prison corporate executives whose pants were on fire over the past two weeks.  On the plus side, our crop yields will set records this year due to the amount of b.s. that we just got showered with. 

Over the past two weeks, the Arizona Dept. of Corrections (ADC) conducted public hearings on proposed private prisons in 5 Arizona towns:  Eloy, Goodyear, Winslow, San Luis/Yuma, and Coolidge.  At each hearing, the ADC gave a presentation on the bidding process, the Corporation gave a (sometimes quite lengthy) presentation on how awesome they think they are, and members of the public got 5 minutes apiece to raise concerns, ask questions, or, in many cases, beg them for jobs.

In their efforts to win a multi-million dollar contract, the corporations—CCA, GEO Group, MTC, and LaSalle—told some real whoppers.  Here are our favorites, plus the truth that they are trying to hide.

Lie # 10:  “No immigrant prisoners have died in CCA’s Eloy Detention Center.”

When asked about an ACLU investigation that revealed the Eloy Detention Center had the most inmate deaths of any detention center in the US, CCA’s talking head said it just never happened. 

But records from the US Department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement prove that nine immigrants have died while in custody at Eloy since 2003, two more than reported at any other facility.  The deaths were only discovered because of an ACLU lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act asking for a comprehensive list of deaths in 2007. In April, the Department of Homeland Security released a list of 90 individuals who died while in custody.

Just because CCA tried to cover the deaths up doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. 

Lie # 9:  “Jobs, jobs, jobs.”

At all the hearings, the sales pitch was the same:  This prison will create umpteen construction jobs and kazillions of guard jobs.  The corporations are manipulating the financial distress of rural Arizona towns to get themselves a multi-million dollar contract.  So, what will the people of the next Arizona Prison Town get?

Well, they’ll get a few jobs, but not nearly the number they were promised.  Here’s why:

• Private prison corporations are based in other states.  They are huge companies and bring in their own architects and construction companies.  They usually have relationships with distributors, and because buying in bulk is cheaper, they will go with those companies over local ones.  They will tell you that they will “try” to use as many local vendors “as possible,” but then they will determine that those local vendors are not competitive in their pricing or cannot handle the volume and they will go with the ones that they usually use. 
• These towns are tapped out.  Every one of them already has at least one prison or a prison nearby.  Eloy has several.  Pinal County, where Eloy and Coolidge are located, has 6 CCA prisons, two entire state prison complexes (with about 5 units each), a few federal detention centers, and a county jail that also rents out space to CCA. 
• The private prisons can’t keep people in the jobs they have now.  The Arizona Republic has reported that, “This year, through the end of June, the state has withheld about $844,000 from Kingman, $54,000 from Marana (also operated by MTC) and about $6,000 from Geo Group’s Phoenix West and Florence West prisons for failing to fill vacant positions quickly enough.”

Obviously, working in a prison isn’t for everyone.  These are difficult jobs, with long hours, and stressful conditions.  One corrections officer described it as “long stretches of boredom punctuated by moments of terror.”  Not every unemployed person in this town is going to want to work in the prison.  Or they will get a job there and quit shortly after.

Oh, and here’s another interesting twist:  The Yuma Sun recently reported that Bullhead City has reached a deal with the Arizona Department of Corrections and Management and Training Corporation for inmates from the Arizona State Prison in Kingman to perform park and street maintenance work in the city.  That’s right:  Instead of creating jobs, they are tossing Bullhead City residents out of these low wage jobs and replacing them with prison labor.  How many jobs will be lost there?  How many other towns will follow suit?

Lie #8:  “The prison will bring economic development to your town.”

Decades worth of research proves that prisons are not good economic growth for towns.

• In states with at least one private prison as of 1990, prisons have been shown to reduce the number of jobs overall in a community.  You might get prison jobs, but you won’t get other kinds of jobs that pay better.
• Private prisons pay less, which means that state prisons have to compete, driving wages down for everyone.
• As mentioned previously, relatively few corrections officers live in the same town as the prison where they work, which means they spend their money somewhere else.   One study estimates that up to two-thirds of potential tax revenues and other economic benefits leave the host community in this way.
• Having a prison nearby is not a draw for other kinds of businesses, and in many cases will scare them away.  Who wants to build a housing development or school near a prison?  Many Arizona towns are cultivating tourism due to historic landmarks and buildings, natural beauty, or scenery—what happens when you plop a huge prison with hundreds of feet of razor wire down in the middle of a historic area or pristine natural landscape?

One need go no further than Florence, AZ to see the true economic impacts of being a prison town.  You can bet they heard the exact same sales pitch when those prisons were proposed.  Where is the economic boom they were promised?  Where are the stores?  The industry?  The housing developments?  If prisons are so great for local economies, why doesn’t Florence have a thriving downtown? 

The bottom line is, once you have prisons, all you will ever have is prisons.

One final note:  Several residents noted during the hearings that Arizona is in a very sorry state when the only type of economic development offered to people is from an industry that is so harmful to our communities in so many ways.  One retired firefighter at the Goodyear hearing put it this way:  “Our fire station budget was cut and many firefighters were laid off.  But we don’t go around saying, ‘we need more fires.’”

Lie #7:  “We’ve learned from our mistakes.”

You gotta hand it to them—it takes some serious moxie to tell people that, because of your company’s gross negligence resulting in two deaths, your prisons are now the safest in the state.  Especially when we know that MTC dragged its feet on fixing the problems at Kingman and only got its act together when the state stopped paying them.

A security audit of Arizona’s private prisons completed after the escapes reveals that the problems at Kingman are endemic to all private prisons in the state.  Here’s what it found:

“At the three Geo prisons – Florence West, Phoenix West and the Central Arizona Correctional Facility – Corrections Department inspectors found such issues as inmates having access to a control panel that could open emergency exits; an alarm system that didn’t ring properly when doors were opened or left ajar; and that staff didn’t carry out such basic security practices as searching commissary trucks and drivers, among many other failures.

At MTC’s Marana prison, there were broken monitors, a control-room panel that didn’t work, missing perimeter lights, missing razor wire, missing visitor passes. Marana’s swamp coolers – in August, in Arizona – weren’t working, making it hotter inside the prison buildings than outside.”

You can read the full report, obtained through a public records request by Arizona Republic reporter Bob Ortega, on the Republic website.

Not only did MTC resist making the necessary fixes to Kingman demanded by the Department of Corrections, they threatened to sue us for attempting to hold them accountable.  When ADC pulled our prisoners out after the escapes and refused to pay MTC until the security problems were fixed, MTC threatened to sue us for $10 million.  Because they have better lawyers and more money than God, we rolled over.  We paid this corporation $3 million for empty beds—beds that were empty due to their gross negligence, which resulted in two deaths. 

Clearly, this is not a corporation that “learns from its mistakes.  It’s a company that is wholly unaccountable for its mistakes. 

Lie #6:  GEO Group’s contract to run the Cook County juvenile detention center was cancelled because the state wanted to move the facilities from rural to urban areas, NOT because of the rampant abuse of children by GEO’s guards.

Baloney.  The New York Times reported that “Juvenile detainees as young as 13 years old slept on filthy mats in dormitories with broken, overflowing toilets and feces smeared on the walls. Denied outside recreation for weeks at a time, they ate bug-infested food, did school work that consisted of little more than crossword puzzles and defecated in bags.”

In response, Texas “has transferred the 197 offenders in Bronte to other institutions, fired seven monitoring officials and canceled an $8 million contract with the GEO Corporation, the prison company in Boca Raton, Fla., that managed the center. The state has also opened a criminal investigation and a review of the adult prisons run by GEO.” 

Lie #5:  “Our security system is state-of-the-art”

I would bet a large sum of money that this exact same pitch was made to the people of Kingman when that prison was built.  They might have fancy technology, but does it work?  And if it stops working, will they fix it?  See the security audit referenced under Lie #5—broken monitors, control-room panels that don’t work, alarms that don’t ring properly, malfunctioning security cameras.  These problems were found in all our private prisons.

Technology is only as good as the people using it.  We consistently hear after a riot or escape that a for-profit prison was having “staffing issues.”  That pay was low, there was a lack of training, and the guards were inexperienced.  Clearly, ADC has gotten wise and is requiring contractors to provide the same training as the state—it’s written into the RFP.  But that doesn’t address the turnover problem.  Those folks might get trained, but they won’t stick around.  That means that a large percentage of the staff is inexperienced and unlikely to know how to handle a dangerous situation.  One report stated that 80% of the guards at Kingman were recent hires.

At Kingman, the guards were propping those state-of-the-art security doors open with rocks.  They ignored those high-tech alarms when they went off.  The ADC monitor was either asleep at the switch or being blown off by Central office.  As they say, “you can’t fix stupid.”

Lie #4:  “The town is not taking any risks in the financing scheme for the prison”

Prison construction for private facilities is almost always financed through lease revenue bonds.  They generally create an “Industrial Development Authority” or “Public Facilities Corporation,” which is essentially a paper tiger created through the city or county.  The reason they fund through this mechanism is because they don’t want to take the risk, carry the paper, nor pay the interest. 

When industrial revenue bonds are issued, the public is often told that neither the local government nor the taxpayers will be obligated or negatively affected in any way if the project fails.  While it’s true that revenue bonds are not a general obligation of the issuer, it is not true that governments and taxpayers will be unaffected by the risks of the project. 

The debt is paid off with the money received as per-diem payments for each inmate housed.  This looks great on paper, but what happens when there are no inmates?

The savvy businessperson approaches any financing project asking “where is the market?”  In this case, the financing for these prisons is dependent on a guaranteed occupancy of state prisoners.  Yet the Arizona Auditor General reports that our prison population grew by only 65 prisoners in 2010.  And there’s a movement afoot in the state legislature to reduce our prison population as 25+other states have done through sensible reforms to criminal sentencing laws favoring cheaper alternatives like probation, drug treatment, and house arrest.

If there’s no market, then these projects are doomed to fail.  And what will happen to the town then?  What if the corporation gets a better offer somewhere else and decides to pull out of the contract?  What if Arizona’s prison population goes down?

Don’t just take my word for it.  Here’s what the Director of the Oklahoma DOC said after Arizona pulled its inmates out of a private prison there:  He said the private prison industry is a speculative market.  “It is not immune to recession and trends in sentencing and crime,” Jones said. “A lot of states have gone back and applied research to their sentencing practices, which results in sentences that are more evidence-based, and that obviously affects a market that relies upon incarceration.”

There are numerous cautionary examples of towns facing default struggling to pay the debt on an empty prison:  Hardin, MT is one of the most notable.  The town there got so desperate that they actually asked the state to send them sex offenders and lobbied the Obama administration to send Guantanamo detainees.  A few weeks ago, the town of Littlefield, TX had to hold a public auction to sell a prison there so that they could pay the debt on the facility after GEO group cancelled its contract and left the town holding the bag. 

Even if the town isn’t directly responsible for paying the debt on the prison, a default on the bond can affect the town’s credit rating (kinda like S&P just did to the United States).  That can make it difficult for the town to borrow money for other needed projects like new schools or a hospital.  Some towns have taken desperate measures to try to pay the debt on a prison in an effort to avoid default, including raising taxes and cutting other critical city budgets.  A bond default can also make a city the target of costly litigation, further draining the town’s coffers. 

Lie #3:  “It’s impossible to measure recidivism from our prisons, because the prisoners may be housed in several different facilities during their incarceration.”—Terry Stewart, former Director of the Arizona Department of Corrections and now consultant for MTC

We asked every one of the companies what their recidivism rate was, and none of them had an answer.  Isn’t that convenient?  These companies can make claims about how they supposedly are “changing lives” and rehabilitating people, and they don’t even have to prove it. 

Probation departments, social service providers and re-entry programs all measure recidivism.  They don’t say, “well, this guy is also getting services at the VA and the food bank, so there’s no way to measure the impact of our programs.” 

Let’s face it–these corporations know that their recidivism rate won’t be any better than the state’s and probably worse. 

What’s more, the Arizona Department of Corrections has all this data, they just won’t go to the trouble to analyze it.  They could easily do a comparison between state prisoners who have been housed in private prisons at any point in their incarceration, and those who have only been in state facilities. 

Lie #2:  “What lawsuits?”

When directly asked whether the company had settled lawsuits over abusive conditions in its juvenile prisons in Michigan and Louisiana, GEO Group representatives hemmed and hawed and refused to answer the question.  We consider this the same as lying.

As reported in the Dallas Morning News, GEO not only faced lawsuits over bad conditions, but they actually lost contracts due to their abuses. 

The U.S. Justice Department sued the company in 2000, when it was known as Wackenhut Corrections Corp., alleging that juveniles at the company’s Louisiana facility were subjected to excessive abuse and neglect. Wackenhut agreed to a settlement that provided for sweeping changes to Louisiana’s juvenile justice system and required the company to move all juveniles from its facility. The former security chief pleaded guilty in 2001 to beating a 17-year-old handcuffed inmate with a mop handle. In October 2005, Michigan closed the state’s private youth prison run by GEO after an advocacy group sued the prison over inadequate inmate care. 

And, rather than accepting responsibility for its actions, the company turned around and sued the state of Michigan for wrongful termination of contract.  How’s that for being a “good corporate citizen”?     

And the #1 Lie told at the Arizona Hearings:  “I’m accountable to you”—George Zoley, CEO of GEO Group

Waaah! Ha! Ha!  Good one, George!  About 30 seconds after uttering this whopper, Zoley proceeded to tell the crowd that GEO does not even bother to measure recidivism and then refused to disclose how much money he makes.  Accountability, indeed.

Fortunately, Frank Smith of Private Corrections Working Group was in attendance and informed the crowd that Zoley made $16 million last year.  Zoley’s pay, he pointed out, is a matter of public record.  As a follow up, Frank provided us with the exact figures.  Zoley’s salary, per companypay.com, was $3,825,433.  He made $23 million in stock trades in the last 18 months. 

Just a note to the boys at GEO corporate—don’t send Zoley to these things.  He creeps people out.

The Arizona Department of Corrections has given a green light to four private, for-profit correctional management corporations for the construction and management of an additional 5,000 state prison beds.

The Department of Corrections will be holding public hearings in each of the towns under consideration for a new prison or prisons.  The public is encouraged to attend and voice their concerns about having a private prison as a neighbor. 

Here is the schedule of the hearings:

1.   Eloy:  Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) has proposed two prisons for Eloy—1,500 beds and 3,000 beds. 

The Eloy public hearing will be held Tuesday, August 9^th, 6-8pm at the Curiel Annex School, 304 West Alsdorf Rd., Eloy. 

2.   Goodyear:  GEO Group (formerly Wackenhut) has proposed a prison that could be anywhere from 2,000 to 5,000 beds. 

The Goodyear public hearing will be held Wednesday, August 10^th, 6-8 pm at the Desert Edge High School Auditorium, 15778 West Yuma Rd., Goodyear.

3.   Winslow:  LaSalle/Southwest Corrections has proposed a 1,000-bed prison for Winslow. 

The Winslow public hearing will be held Thursday, August 11^th, 6-8pm at the Winslow High School Performing Arts Center, 600 E. Cherry St., Winslow.

4.   San Luis (Yuma):  There are two proposed prisons for Yuma.  Management and Training Corporation (MTC) has proposed to build a 3,000-bed prison and GEO Group seeks to build one with 2,000-3,000 beds. 

The San Luis public hearing  for both proposed prisons will be held Tuesday, August 16^th, 6-10pm at the San Luis City Council Chambers, 1090 East Union St., San Luis.

5.   Coolidge:  Management and Training Corporation (MTC) has proposed a prison of 3,000 or 5,000 beds. 

The Coolidge public hearing will be held Thursday, August 18^th, 6-8pm at the Coolidge City Council Chambers, 911 S. Arizona Blvd., Coolidge.

This will be the one and only opportunity that the public will have to give input on these proposed prisons.  Thus far, the only publicity for them has been a statutorily-required posting in the “legal notices” section of the local papers. 

If you know anyone who lives in these communities, please encourage them to attend the hearings.  AFSC will be organizing carpools from Tucson.  Please contact us at:  cisaacs@afsc.org.

Much has been made of Governor Brewer’s intimate ties to Corrections Corporation of America.  Her Chief of Staff, Paul Senseman, is a former CCA lobbyist, and his wife is currently a lobbyist for the company.  Brewer’s campaign manager and senior policy advisor, Chuck Coughlin, runs a consulting firm that also lobbies for CCA in Arizona.  Brewer accepted a total of $60,000 in contributions from people associated with CCA for her campaign and the tax increase initiative that she was pushing last year.  The scandal made waves after the passage of SB1070, raising questions about CCA’s role in drafting legislation that would potentially provide the company with millions more in contracts for immigrant detention facilities in Arizona. 

But Brewer is hardly the only powerful politician in Arizona with ties to this influential industry.  A Cell-Out Arizona investigation has revealed that John Kavanagh (R-8), Chair of the House Appropriations Committee, has accepted numerous campaign contributions from lobbyists and others associated with Geo Group, the nation’s second largest private prison company and one of the bidders for a contract to build and manage 5,000 new prison beds in Arizona. 

Now we know why Kavanagh is such a staunch supporter of private prisons.  He appeared last week on Phoenix Channel 8’s public affairs program, Horizon, debating the issue with Rep. Cecil Ash.  

In the 2010 election cycle, Kavanagh accepted at least 6 donations from lobbyists associated with Geo Group.  According to Beau Hodai’s investigation for In These Times,

“Geo Group employs consulting firm Public Policy Partners…While Public Policy Partners (PPP), an Arizona-based firm, has more than 30 Arizona clients, it only has two clients at the federal level: Geo Group (based in Florida) and Ron Sachs Communications, a Florida-based public-relations firm that, promotes prison privatization. PPP, as a firm, also appears to be an advocate for expanded use of private prisons. Federal lobbying records show PPP owner, John Kaites, lobbying on behalf of the firm on issues of “private correctional detention management.” 

Kavanagh’s campaign finance reports show that he accepted money from John Kaites as well as Ann Peralta Kaites, John’s lovely wife.  He received his-and-hers matching donations from another husband and wife team, Ken and Laurie Quartermain.  Ken is a lobbyist for Public Policy Partners.  Several other donations came from lobbyists with PPP.

It’s a shrewd move for Geo Group.  Since CCA has bought the Governor’s office, the best way to get those lucrative contracts is to buy off the guy in charge of releasing the money for them—the Chair of Appropriations and outgoing Chair of the Joint Legislative Budget Committee.

The Arizona Department of Corrections has given a green light to four private, for-profit correctional management corporations for the construction and management of an additional 5,000 state prison beds.

The American Friends Service Committee condemns this action as unnecessary and deeply irresponsible given the state’s economic crisis and the dismal safety records of all four of the corporations involved.

Arizona’s Auditor General estimates this expansion will cost us over $640 million by 2017.  Yet our prison population only grew by only 65 inmates in 2010.

This year, our corrections budget is over $1 billion, consuming 11% of the state general fund.  The Department of Corrections was the only state agency whose budget saw an increase this year.

The New York Times reported recently that data from Arizona and elsewhere show that private prisons do not save money, even though they often selectively house only the cheapest prisoners.

Even after the horrific escapes from a private prison in Kingman last summer, the state Department of Corrections has yet to complete a full comparison of the safety, effectiveness, and security of all its private prisons, despite the fact that such a review is required by Arizona Revised Statute 41-1609.01.

But even a cursory review reveals that each of the competing corporations have histories of mismanagement, prisoner abuse and neglect, escapes, riots, staff misconduct, and other scandals.  Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) found a significantly higher rate of prisoner-on-prisoner assaults in private prisons (66% more) than in public prisons.  Inmate-on-staff assaults were 49% higher in the for-profits.  Consider the following:

• GEO Group has had at least 27 escapes in the last 7 years
• In addition to the infamous Kingman escapes, Management and Training Corporation in two separate instances has been ordered by the U.S. Department of Labor to repay a total of more than $650,000 in back wages to officers from whom it withheld overtime pay in Texas and four other states

• CCA’s Saguaro Correctional Center here in Arizona has been plagued by violence, including an incident in which a prisoner strangled his cellmate while the prison was in lockdown in June 2010.  That same year, a prison employee suffered a broken nose and cheekbones as well as eye socket damage during a 30-inmate riot over an Xbox.  Saguaro was also the site of the stabbing death by two inmates who now face the death penalty.
• La Salle has had eight escapes in the past six years

These and other problems were revealed by Robert Ortega in a recent series of articles in the Arizona Republic.  Ortega submitted public records requests to the Department of Corrections for the results of security reviews of Arizona’s public and private prisons after the Kingman escapes.  The results are deeply disturbing–major security flaws were found in all the state’s prisons.

In these difficult economic times, when the Governor and Legislature are making devastating cuts to health care, education, and social services, it is absolutely outrageous that we would waste scarce tax dollars on private prisons that generate no savings and are not keeping the public safe.

In this day and age, most of us can relate to the feeling that our elected officials aren’t really listening to us or acting in our best interests.  But here’s the story of a group of citizens who are actually going to do something about it. 

Citizens Opposed to Globe Becoming a Prison Town has been organizing against a proposed private prison there for almost a year now.  They are one of the most effective and organized yet truly grassroots groups out there.  They have packed City Council meetings with people speaking out against the prison and handed in thousands of signatures of Globe residents on a petition in opposition to the plan.  Yet their City Council and Economic Development Board have refused to listen. 

So they are going to put the democratic process to the test.  They’re going to put the prison up for a vote. 

They have two ballot initiatives in the works.  The first simply says that no new prison can be built in Globe without first being approved by residents through a public vote.  The second requires voter approval for any municipal resource to be spent or utilized for any new prison construction project within, or outside Globe’s jurisdictional boundaries.

It’s a simple concept, but revolutionary in today’s political environment, particularly where these kinds of prison development deals are concerned.  Given the scandals that have recently arisen regarding Arizona politicians on the take (Fiesta Bowl, anyone?) and influence-peddling by corporations in state government (two of the Governor’s top advisors have ties to Corrections Corporation of America), what happens when you put the people BACK in the equation?  What might we learn by exposing these ordinarily backroom deals to the light of day?

The people of Globe are about to find out.  And you can bet that the for-profit prison corporations will be watching very closely to see what happens, because if the people of Globe can do it, so can the people of Florence, or Eloy, or Tucson.  Score one for democracy.

You can read the group’s official press release here:

Public Information/Press Release                                        June 3, 2011

TWO Ballot Initiatives are being launched by Citizens of Globe, AZ who do not want their community to become another rural Arizona Prison Town.

These TWO Ballot Initiatives are closely related, but have distinct purposes.  (see attached)

The first Ballot Initiative is titled, VOTERS MUST APPROVE NEW PRISON IN GLOBE ACT.  It requires Voter approval for any new prison constructed within Globe’s City Limits.

The second Ballot Initiative is titled, NO CITY RESOURCE SPENT ON NEW PRISON ACT.   It requires Voter approval for any municipal resource to be spent or utilized for any new prison construction project within, or outside Globe’s jurisdictional boundaries.

Citizens have launched these TWO Ballot Initiatives because local elected officials refuse to pass a Resolution that would prohibit a 1000 to 2000 – bed proposed private prison from being constructed in the Globe community. 

Nearly a year ago, citizens began speaking out in opposition to a proposed private prison project.  More than 2,500 area residents signed a Declaration of Opposition to such a prison, and implored elected officials to pass a Resolution that would safeguard their community from the private prison ‘industry’.  These elected officials refused to act on behalf of their constituents.  Globe residents continue to ask, “If they don’t represent the citizens of this community, then who do they represent?”  

The Arizona Constitution provides for citizens to “Initiate”, or propose laws or measures that are enacted by a direct vote of the people.  The citizens of Globe are now taking action to accomplish what their elected representatives refused and failed to do. 

Citizens of Globe must gather 582 signatures to place these TWO Initiatives on the ballot at the City’s next regular election in March, 2012.  Registered Voters of Globe, Arizona will ultimately decide the outcome of this very important community issue.

The Committees organizing these TWO Ballot Initiative Campaigns are receiving legal counsel from the Phoenix Law Firm, Perkins Coie, LLP.  Attorney, Rhonda L. Barnes, can be reached at 602-351-8305 or RBarnes@perkinscoie.com.

Jim E. Moss, Committee Chairman

480-540-1279 or mossjim13@hotmail.com

An article published today in the New York Times has revealed to the world what you heard here first:  Private prisons are not saving us money.  The article cites Arizona research that shows that, overall, we’re losing money on our private prisons.

Yet, the Department of Corrections is preparing to award lucrative contracts to for-profit prison companies to build and run 5,000 new private prison beds.

Arizona’s Auditor General estimates this expansion will cost us over $640 million by 2017.  Yet our prison population only grew by only 65 inmates in 2010.

This year, our corrections budget is over $1 billion, consuming 11% of the state general fund.  In these difficult economic times, when the Governor and Legislature are making devastating cuts to health care, education, and social services, it is absolutely outrageous that we would waste scarce tax dollars on private prisons that generate no savings.

Other states, which formerly had sentencing laws similar to those now in effect in Arizona, enacted sentencing reforms between 1999 and 2010. States saw reductions in prison populations while violent and other crime rates fell significantly. Annual savings in these states are estimated at as much as $80 million annually.

If the Governor really wants to make us safer and balance the budget, she should support the efforts of Representative Ash and others to reform Arizona’s harsh sentencing laws.

OK, nobody’s pretending that Arizona State Legislators listen to NPR.  But if they did, they might learn that they are about to make a $65 million mistake in awarding contracts for 5,000 more private prison beds in Arizona.  

The reports both focus on the exploits of the GEO Group, the nation’s second largest private prison company and one of the bidders for a lucrative new contract here in Arizona.  Sadly, these problems are not limited to one corporation—there are similar examples on the rap sheets of every for-profit prison operator.  That’s because they all have the same problem:  They are in the business of making money first, and they will always prioritize profits over protecting the public or rehabilitating prisoners.

A two-part expose aired last month lays out two of the inherent risks in handing over corrections to for-profit corporations:

1.  The profit motive trumps rehabilitation
2. Small towns can get left holding the bag for empty prisons when the prison corporations go after more lucrative contracts

The first installment, “Town Relies on Troubled Youth Prison for Profit,” details how a small town became so financially dependent on the Walnut Grove juvenile prison that elected officials, monitors, and other government actors have repeatedly turned a blind eye to rampant abuses against incarcerated youth.  NPR found that the prison is paying the town $15,000 in lieu of taxes, paying $4,500/month to the Correctional Authority, and even “reimbursing” the salary of the corrections employee whose job is to monitor how the prison is run.

Who’s going to let a little sexual abuse, drug trafficking, or medical neglect in comparison get in the way of such a cash cow?  

In the second part of the expose (the amusingly alliterative, “Private Prison Promises Leave Texas Towns in Trouble”), NPR reveals how a small rural town was left on the verge of bankruptcy after GEO Group pulled out of a contract to run their detention center.  To avoid defaulting on the loan they took out to build the prison, the city has “raised property taxes, increased water and sewer fees, laid off workers and held off on buying a new police car.” 

Citizens of towns like Globe, Eloy, Sahuarita, and Benson would do well to study this report.  The story and even the actors may be uncomfortably familiar.  Here’s how it goes:

1.  A guy by the name of James Parkey comes to your town representing a company named Corplan
2. He makes a sales pitch to your Mayor and Council promising a brand-spanking new prison for immigrants, or state inmates, or inmates from another state that won’t cost you a cent to build.  The private operator will finance, construct, and operate the prison and pay off the costs with the money generated by the contracts they get to put inmates in the facility 
3. Your town elders, desperate for jobs and economic development sign on the dotted line
4. Everything is swell until you can’t find any inmates
5. The town is left scrambling to keep from defaulting on the bonds for the prison; the town’s credit rating is down graded making it hard for the town to borrow money for new schools or hospitals;  and drastic measures are taken like raising taxes, laying off workers, and putting off other important projects or purchases

Think it can’t happen here?  Prisoners aren’t as easy to come by as they once were.  Crime is down, and many cash-strapped states turn to sentencing reform to reduce prison populations and save money. 

In some cases, horrendous abuses and lawsuits against the prison corporations have led states to cancel contracts.  This is the case in Hawaii:  That state’s Governor has pledged to pull their prisoners out of a CCA prison in Eloy, Arizona after abuses and deaths in that company’s Saguaro Detention Center came to light.  CCA is currently the largest employer in Pinal County, and is most likely one of the bidders on those 5,000 new beds.     

It’s pretty clear that our state legislators are not listening to the warning signs.  Maybe it was those steak dinners that CCA paid for at the ALEC meeting or the donation checks they got during the last election cycle.  So, that means it’s up to the voters and taxpayers to get the facts and make our voices heard.  Private prisons aren’t good economic development.  They’re a short-sighted boondoggle that could leave our children on the hook for our leader’s poor decisions.

Yesterday, AFSC representatives gathered at the Capitol to deliver testimonies, along with pages and pages of independent research and published works that make the incontrovertible case against the practice of for-profit incarceration.  The event was covered by KPHO’s crack reporter, Morgan Loew.  Loew has long been a thorn in the side of for-profit prisons, exposing their influence-peddling in Arizona state government.

That same day, the Arizona Republic announced that several bills to impose oversight and reporting requirements on private prisons were effectively dead because the Chair of Judiciary refuses to allow them a hearing.

The Arizona Auditor General reports that Arizona is set to add 6,500 private beds at an estimated cost of $640 million through 2017.  This year, our corrections budget is over $1 billion, consuming 11% of the state general fund.

In the midst of a crippling budget crisis, as devastating cuts are continuing in the areas of health care and K-12 education, Arizona is poised to award more multi-million dollar contracts to these corporations with absolutely no guarantee that they save money or are safe for our communities.

In fact, a review of the available research data, from Arizona and nationally, presents compelling evidence to the contrary.

FACT: Private prisons in Arizona are not cheaper than public prisons. In fact, they cost more on average.  The Arizona Department of Corrections has done a cost comparison analysis every year since 2005, and the results are consistent.  The most recent of these, from 2009, shows that the State paid private prisons $55.89 for each medium-custody inmate per day compared to a daily cost of $48.13 per medium-custody inmate in state facilities. The State also paid private prisons slightly more for each minimum-custody prisoner.

FACT: Private Prisons are less safe. If the Kingman escapes did not prove this point sufficiently, there is a host of federal research data and published media accounts to verify it.  Private prison operators make their money through securing contracts with governments (county, state, federal) to house their prisoners.  These contracts go to the lowest bidder, so in order to make a profit, these corporations cut corners, most often in the areas of staff pay and training and Research and Development (R&D).  This results in facilities that are short staffed, with high turnover rates, and inexperienced staff.  This combination is a recipe for unsafe facilities.

FACT:  For-profit prison corporations are not accountable to the taxpayers of Arizona. While it can be very difficult to obtain information from state-run prisons, it is ultimately possible to do so because these are government institutions and thus are subject to laws requiring disclosure of public information.  However, private prison companies are not currently subject to the same laws, and therefore are immune to the normal checks and balances that protect people from abuse by such institutions.

This is particularly true in the case of prisons that do not contract with the state.  These prisons are accepting prisoners from other states and the federal government, yet are not required to report to local law enforcement or state entities who they are holding, what crimes they were convicted of, what their population numbers are, what their staffing levels are, or what programs they offer to prisoners.  They do not have to disclose their budgets or other financial matters.  They are not required to report disturbances or assaults.

This is precisely the problem that Representative Campbell is addressing in his bills.  These bills are perfectly in line with our recommendations for increased oversight and monitoring of private prisons, and we thank Rep. Campbell for his efforts.  To read the text of each bill, click on the number:

HB2298 General, Private Prison Monitoring

HB2299 Private Prisons; Regulation

HB2300 Private Prison Contractors; Public Records

HB2589 Legislative Hearings; Private Prison Escape

HB2590 Prisons; Security Monitoring Systems; Notification

Unfortunately, Senator Gould, Chair of Judiciary Committee was quoted as saying that he “did not believe these bills are necessary.”

So, just to be clear, Sen. Gould believes it is not necessary for you to know if a private prison is importing murderers or sex offenders into Arizona from other states.  Sen. Gould also believes it is not necessary for you to know if those inmates escape.  And, Sen. Gould believes it is not necessary for you to know whether or not the alarms work in a prison.

Sen. Gould represents a district that includes Kingman, site of the infamous prison operated by MTC from which three murders escaped last summer.  Of all people, you’d think he would understand the risks inherent in for-profit incarceration.  How on earth could he want to block legislation that simply holds these facilities to the same standards as other prisons?

We are left with two possible conclusions:

1.       That Se. Gould is so ideologically wedded to the idea of privatization that he is unable or unwilling to face reality, or;

2.      That, like Governor Brewer, he has been bought by the for-profit prison industry.

Recent media reports have revealed the influence of the for-profit prison industry in the Governor’s office and have suggested that these corporations were behind SB1070, Arizona’s controversial immigration bill, which, if fully implemented, would likely have led to an increase in the number of immigrants held in ICE detention facilities in Arizona, the majority of which are operated by Corrections Corporation of America.

For decades, for-profit prison interests (usually lobbyists) have contributed heavily to Arizona politicians.  Lobbyists and former employees of prison corporations have moved on to positions of power in Arizona where they have influence over decisions impacting the growth of prison populations, awarding of contracts, and other policy matters.  For example:

• Paul Senseman, Gov. Brewer’s Chief of Staff is a former lobbyist for CCA and his wife is currently lobbying for them
• Chuck Coughlin, the Governor’s campaign manager, runs a public relations firm that lobbies for CCA
• Mark Brnovich, Chair of the Governor’s Commission on Privatization and Efficiency, served as a Senior Director of State and Customer Relations for Corrections Corporation of America from 2005-2006 and was a lobbyist for them in 2007

Dem blog AZ Blue Meanie has suggested that perhaps Sen. Gould has taken such a strident position because he, like the Governor, has been bought by the for-profit prison industry.  His district includes the city of Kingman, home of the infamous MTC prison.  You’d think of all people, he would know the risks involved in privatization by now.  Then again, maybe he’s been talking to MTC’s high-powered lobbyists.

AFSC has made all their research on the issue available via their webpage.  This includes the testimonies received for the public hearing on prison privatization held in Tucson on October 27, 2010.  There are links to national coverage, published reports, and government studies all showing that private prisons are more costly, less safe, and less accountable to taxpayers.

AFSC is making all of this public in an effort to encourage voters to do the due diligence on prison privatization that our lawmakers, like Sen. Gould, refuse to do.

If you are outraged by the actions of Sen. Gould, AFSC has also put out an action alert, encouraging people to contact the Senate President and Speaker of the house.  If you are interested in making your voice heard, please do so IMMEDIATELY.  The deadline for bills to be heard in committee is this FRIDAY, 2/18.