Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 19, 1993 TAG: 9309040334
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Yes. The concept of government contracting with the private sector to build or manage correctional facilities can no longer be dismissed as radical and untested. It now has a 10-year track record that suggests, in specific cases and assuming careful monitoring, it might be in the public's interest.
r= There are now 56 privately run adult prisons and jails around the country hosting about 18,000 federal, state and local inmates. In some cases, studies have shown, taxpayers are saving up to 15 percent of what it would cost if government were running the facilities.
Meanwhile, Virginia still faces the prospect that it will have to pony up $4.4 billion by the year 2000 to build and operate enough prisons and jails to keep up with its swelling population of convicts.
More has got to be done to control runaway costs of imprisonment. Privatizing parts of this growth industry has got to be considered - along with more and better alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent criminals and better rehabilitation programs to reduce recidivism.
So legislators should take another look. They shouldn't buy, though, until they're sure they have the right answers to several questions, among them:
Would the state retain adequate oversight?
The prisoners, after all, would still be government's prisoners. The state would still have the responsibility to ensure that they are treated humanely, that prisoners' rights are not violated. It still would be the state's responsibility to respond, and respond quickly, in the event of an escape or riot.
The terms of contracts with proprietors should leave no question as to the state's authority to monitor and step in and take control whenever necessary.
Second, would the proper incentives be in place?
Would private-prison operators, for instance, have enough incentive to offer rehabilitation programs that would reduce recidivism and empty for-profit beds? Or would the profit motive drive an ever-more-powerful lobbying engine for the lock-'em-up-and-throw-away- the-key approach, an approach that many lawmakers already find irresistible?
Virginia should not support a ``Death Row, Inc.,'' in which stock values rise or fall depending on the number of executions.
And while they're asking these questions, lawmakers also ought to ask this:
If it's true that private-prison operators can deliver services at lower costs, why?
Private operators claim they'd be less constrained by bureaucratic red tape and regulations than is the state's Department of Corrections.
In the building of prisons, they contend they're able to reduce costs and save taxpayers' money by using innovative architectural designs and technology.
In the operating of private prisons, they claim numerous cost-effective techniques - including sophisticated electronic-surveillance systems that enable them to hire fewer guards and other prison personnel.
Fine. If such innovations are the secret to more cost-efficient prisons, why isn't the legislature insisting that the Corrections Department use them? And if red tape is adding to Virginia's astronomical prison costs, why not act immediately to cut what can be cut?
Oh yes - there's one more question lawmakers need answered.
At the urging of Del. Frank Hall, D-Richmond, the General Assembly passed legislation a couple of years ago that gave the Department of Corrections authority to move ahead with two pilot private-prison projects - one for juveniles; one for women. The department balked, arguing that there would be no cost benefits.
Lawmakers need to determine if corrections officials might be, for less-than-noble reasons, obstructing a trial run on private prisons in Virginia. Could it be they fear that department-run facilities might look the worse by comparison?
The stakes are too high for taxpayers and legislators to tolerate turf protection in the Corrections Department. In this game of Monopoly, the deck is loaded. When so many cards read "Go to jail," the state has to find ways to get more of its money's worth from the pens. Assuming, that is, it asks the right questions and gets the right answers.
by CNB