Holte's corner

Chains At the Crossroads

I work with contractors. I have that Dilbert, Dogbert, evil contractor/ employee side to me. I can smell a money-making prospect when I come near it. And I've usually been right. My evil Dark (You know Spock with a beard) side could have made me a millionaire (or bigger) several times over had I acted on it. And while I haven't acted on those inspirations others have. I guess that is why the subject makes me so angry. There but for a sense of ethics could have gone I.

Twenty years ago I was considering the idea of modularized prisons. I was working in an environment that resembled a prison. All it needed was a little more security and it would have made a wonderful prison. I had the idea of modularizing prisons, privatizing them, stacking modules in warehouse type buildings and hardening the buildings inside out -- also using modularized security. I also was thinking of using such modularized containers for shipping big things, but nobody in my environment was interested in the idea, so like any Good Fred Flinstone Everyman I let it slide.

Well now the darkside of that idea is being pushed by other people less ethically challenged than I. They are pushing for the privatization of the nations prisons. Gosh I could make a lot of money working for them. But I'll pass.

Still my Evil-Catbert side has considered the posibilities and all the money to be made. The contractors will get fabulously rich. They can build prisons, employ prisoners, charge the government for feeding and clothing the prisoners and offset their costs by prison industries. We can finally compete with the Chinese! This ought to be an April Fools joke -- but it isn't:

http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060322/20060322005799.html:

"The Federal Bureau of Prisons ("BOP") through a Presolicitation Notice intends to issue a Request for Proposal ("RFP") for Criminal Alien Requirement 6. The BOP expects to contract for approximately 7,000 inmates currently located in a number of facilities located in West Texas. The RFP would include inmates currently housed at the Company's owned and operated 1,225-bed Eden Detention Center located in Eden, Texas, as well as inmates housed in other facilities operated by other private correction providers."

Now this is what is known as a "Low Rate initial production" effort. If the contractor performs well, this effort could well be followed with much larger expansion in capability. Think they aren't serious about enforcing imigration law? They've found an even better way to "deal" with the problem. No need for a final solution, just make immigrating illegally criminal, and the some of the same companies that are employing illegal aliens illegally can start employing them legally -- as "Prison industries."

Now CCA is a good company, they claim:

"CCA is the nation's largest owner and operator of privatized correctional and detention facilities and one of the largest prison operators in the United States, behind only the federal government and three states. The Company currently operates 63 facilities, including 39 company-owned facilities, with a total design capacity of approximately 71,000 beds in 19 states and the District of Columbia. The Company specializes in owning, operating and managing prisons and other correctional facilities and providing inmate residential and prisoner transportation services for governmental agencies. In addition to providing the fundamental residential services relating to inmates, the Company's facilities offer a variety of rehabilitation and educational programs, including basic education, religious services, life skills and employment training and substance abuse treatment. These services are intended to reduce recidivism and to prepare inmates for their successful re-entry into society upon their release. The Company also provides health care (including medical, dental and psychiatric services), food services and work and recreational programs."

It's just a footnote after all. They offer prisoners "work and recreational programs." Recreation in the great outdoors picking fruit? All the work a worker can do? I wish I was kidding, we aren't there yet, but look where we are headed! but the Daily Texan has this to say:
(http://tinyurl.com/kpjnt)

"Today, like every day, there are about 22,000 immigrants being held in detention for increasingly prolonged periods of time, often without trials. The vast majority are being held for minor offenses, from shoplifting or minor drug possession, yet are being held for increasingly prolonged periods before their deportation hearings. In fact, since the 1980's, immigrants have come under increasingly brutal treatment and longer incarceration by states and the U.S. government."

"One such piece of legislation is the Intelligence Reform Act of 2004, which set aside funding for 40,000 new prison beds, including proposed immigrant super-jails on the south Texas border. "

Of course this is "low rate initial production" comparied to a project of incarcerating numbers comparable to the population of Ohio (just from the proposed law on immigration -- minimum 11 million people). The article notes:

"Another federal bill, already passed by the House of Representatives, would make felons of the 12 million undocumented workers in the U.S. for simply being in the country. The Border Protection, Antiterrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005 makes all undocumented immigrants in the U.S. aggravated felons under law and would subject them to longer imprisonment or deportation."

This would be one hell of a guest-worker program once they figure that they can have their cake and eat it too. Guest-workers make great prison workers. Make immigration violations a felony and prisoners can pick grapes.

"Private prison companies such as Corrections Corporation of America, or CCA (partially owned by Farallon, a hedge fund that invests money for the University), and Wackenhut, now called the GEO Group, have given millions to federal and state legislators. Consequently, they have been rewarded by legislation on prison bills in states and granted increasingly larger contracts for immigrant prisons. With their influence, punitive measures for both immigrants and U.S. citizens have increased among many states and in the country as a whole."

Currently they make all sorts of useful things. If what I fear is happening happens, I can't really blame the contractors. After all we are all only human. It's a system that encourages people to loot the commons, and "privatize" things that ought to be sacred -- such as human autonomy. If there is money to be made a certain way, eventually people will figure out how to make it that way. And the value of prison workers has been recognized since Ancient Egypt. It's not a new idea. All that is new is the application of computers to make a more efficient reality, and even that builds on previous successes. The Nazis couldn't have processed 6-7 million Jews so efficiently without IBM Punch Cards or Taylor inspired Project Plans. We can do it if we want to. We can efficiently "deal with" immigrants (and drug users) if we want to. They can just disapear. If they aren't productive in society they can be productive prisoners.

And if my CatBert side can think of it. You can be pretty damn sure that the less ethically challenged of my "brothers" out there have already planned it, thought it out, plotted it out, calculated the ROI and how long it will take -- and are lobbying Congress and State Legistlators to make it a reality. If they don't get it immediately, then they'll just do it a little at a time and wait for someone even less ethically challenged than our current President. Believe me, unless we are vigilent it will happen. There's just too much money to be made by a few people and that is Republican "economy."

http://www.doc.sc.gov/PrisonIndustries/PrisonIndustries.htm
http://www.unicor.gov/index.cfm
We ain't seen nuthin yet?
Further reading:

http://www.prisonactivist.org/crisis/labor-of-doing-time.html

http://www.icorrection.com/usa.html

Posted by cholte at April 2, 2006 08:30 PM