The influence of private prison industry in Arizona is well documented.  Even though they will be publicly run, the companies slated to design and build a proposed 500 new maximum-security prison bed – to the tune of $50 million of public funds – have ties to the private for-profit prison industry that are all too obvious.

Both JE Dunn and DLR Group, the construction and architecture firms contracted for this prison expansion, have worked on recent projects for Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), including CCA’s La Palma Correctional Center in Eloy Arizona.  JE Dunn’s contract bid packet even included a letter of recommendation from CCA regarding the construction of the La Palma Correctional Center:

Clearly, CCA’s influence still carries some weight in this state.

Incidentally, Buddy Johns is now the CEO of CGL, an affiliate of Hunt and competition for JE Dunn. Burn!

There’s probably no need to remind our readers of CCA’s ties to the Governor’s office (but we will anyway). As Beau Hodai first reported for In These Times, Brewer’s former Chief of Staff Paul Senseman lobbied for CCA in Arizona both before and after his stint on the 7^th Floor. And her “advisor” Chuck Coughlin runs a consulting firm that also lobbies for CCA.

And as Phoenix New Times has reported, the corporation has donated major cash-ola to Brewer’s re-election campaign and her pet project of 2010, Prop 100 (sales tax increase).

“In all, seven executives with the Tennessee-based private prisons giant Corrections Corporation of America contributed $980 for the governor’s start-up fund with Arizona’s clean elections system. A warden for one of CCA’s Arizona prisons gave $100. A CCA shareholder gave $140.

Lobbyists listed with the state of Arizona as having CCA as a client gave another $560, for a total of $1,780. In addition, CCA has contributed a whopping $10,000 to the campaign for Prop 100, the one cent sales tax heavily promoted by Brewer…The success of Prop 100 is considered by many to be the linchpin for a Brewer victory in November.”

It just so happens that CCA got a contract to house up to 2,000 Arizona prisoners, starting in 2014. So, no conflict of interest there.

Here’s another similarity between JE Dunn and CCA: They don’t like to pay for things. One requirement of the RFP is to include a 5-year history of settled litigation and arbitration against the company. The list includes seven “pending matters” and 38 settled suits. One recurring theme was the phrase “filed suit against JE Dunn to collect amounts the plaintiff contended it was owed.” There were also a couple claims of “unjust enrichment.” There were 19 such suits between 2007 and 2012, exactly half of those reported in the bid documents.

Buyer beware.

The Joint Committee on Capital Review (JCCR) will review the request for $50 million to build 500 more maximum-security beds this Wednesday, June 12^th, at 9:00 am. The JCCR has the option to give the proposal an “unfavorable review.”

Chair: Sen. Don Shooter dshooter@azleg.gov ; (602) 926-4139

Vice-Chair: Rep. John Kavanagh, jkavanagh@azleg.gov; (602) 926-5170

Only six months have passed since violent criminals escaped the private prison in Kingman, but our legislature has re-issued the request for proposals for a new private prison. Back in August of 2010, killers were literally on the loose while Arizona slept. Gary & Linda Haas were brutally murdered. Private prisons let that happen.

Perhaps our legislature thinks we’ve forgotten due to recent events. But it adds insult to injury to assume that Arizonans are uninterested about decisions affecting our safety.

In fact, Arizonans are saturated with law-and-order and tough-on-crime rhetoric. Gov. Brewer & Senator Pearce won their offices last election by touting SB 1070, even though In These Times and NPR revealed that the law was conceived in the right-wing belly of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), with influence from Corrections Corporation of America – a private company that houses immigrant detainees in Arizona.

But it seems our legislators are confused. The message surrounding SB 1070 was to discourage “criminals” from entering and staying in Arizona. However, the influence of private prison companies creates the exact opposite result: because these companies are paid per prisoner/day, they want to bring more criminals to Arizona and keep them here longer. Because land is cheap, private prison companies look at Arizona like England viewed Australia in the 1800′s – one big prison.

These corporations say they save states money, but they never guarantee it. In fact, the company’s profits/expense to the taxpayers can be increased by lockdowns, giving undeserved disciplinary tickets, resulting in loss of good-time credits. Also, because companies like CCA are involved in drafting laws, they can influence profits by supporting laws that create new crimes, and longer sentences. Cha-ching!

Legislators are galloping down this dangerous road, even though they’ve known for years that privatization will cost more and deplete our already devastated budget. Every year since 2005, our Dept. of Corrections has released an independent study comparing private and public prisons showing that some private prisons are actually more expensive than public prisons. In the 2009 criminal budget bill, there was a provision that required the state to split any savings generated with the for-profit operator! Clearly, some legislators are more interested in benefiting their corporate backers than with saving money.

Arizona laws provide that private prisons under contract with the state must notify the state of any transfers, and compensate any costs associated with escapes. Putting aside the fact that no one can ever fully compensate the people who loved Gary and Linda Haas, this is the only power Arizonans have over these companies. But CCA has six prisons in Arizona that are not under contract with the state, meaning they are not subject to even those modest regulations.

Our state government is putting our lives in danger by handing control of our prisons to the lowest bidder. Corners were cut in Kingman: maximum security prisoners were housed with medium and minimum, the alarms didn’t work, and there weren’t enough guards to watch the entire prison.  Hours elapsed before Management and Training Corporation (MTC) notified the state of the escapes. The public wasn’t warned for over twelve hours.

Arizona needs to decide whether we want to reduce crime, or turn our state into the Botany Bay of America. If we get serious about crime prevention and education, we won’t need to expand our prisons… indeed, we may shrink them, save money, and make Arizona safer for everyone.

The good people of the Phoenix New Times have done it again and provided some stellar in-depth analysis of immigration rhetoric and the role that private prison companies play in the incarceration of undocumented migrants found crossing the border.  Proving once again that you can’t talk about immigration without discussing prison privatization.

Grinding Justice: Operation Streamline Costs Millions, Tramples the Constitution, Treats Migrants Like Cattle, and Doesn’t Work

By Stephen Lemons, Thursday, Oct 21 2010

In the border town of Nogales, Sonora, where buses drop off the newly deported every few hours on the American side, almost everyone seems to have been through Operation Streamline, a U.S. Border Patrol program that aims to hit all migrants entering the United States illegally with a criminal conviction.

There’s the street peddler, Gary, selling multicolored balloons and pinwheels to the cars lining up to cross into Arizona at the main port of entry. He was on his way to San Francisco when he was caught near Sasabe and put through Streamline’s wringer.

“It was a bad experience,” he says (all the Streamline defendants interviewed in this story spoke Spanish). He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of entering the United States without permission, a conviction the Border Patrol believes operates as a deterrent to illegal immigration.  (Read more…)