Pubdate: Sun, 18 Jul 2004 Source: Lexington Herald-Leader (KY) Copyright: 2004 Lexington Herald-Leader Contact: http://www.kentucky.com/mld/heraldleader/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/240 Author: John Cheves COUNTY NEEDS PRISON, BUT DOES KENTUCKY? Privatization For Long-Awaited Elliott Complex Debated SANDY HOOK - The unlovely state prison being finished in Elliott County has the odd look of a suburban high school surrounded by double rows of razor wire. The Corrections Department spent most of a decade planning it. Taxpayers gave $92 million to build it. Local residents, grappling with some of the state's worst unemployment, look forward to working in it. Now, belatedly, comes the debate over whether Kentucky needs it. Gov. Ernie Fletcher's administration says the 961-bed prison -- with space for an 800-bed addition -- won't be necessary for years. The current 14-prison system is sufficient, as more state inmates are steered into county jails, or left in their communities in drug courts or halfway houses, which are cheaper. "The day will come, unfortunately, when we will need all of the beds in Elliott County. But I don't think that day is today," Corrections Commissioner John Rees said. Rees has recommended the Fletcher administration privatize the prison. A company could lease it from Kentucky and rent out its beds to other states. Or it could accept a management contract and house a mix of inmates from Kentucky and other states, trying to run the place for less money than the Corrections Department. Either way, Kentucky taxpayers win, he said. Yet, appealing as that sounds, not everyone buys the logic. Handing the keys to the state's newest and best prison to an outsider would be a huge mistake, according to critics, including law-enforcement officials and Democratic legislators. State prisons ended the month of June with 11,955 inmates and 309 empty beds. But that's only because nearly 6,000 state inmates were parked in lower-cost county jails, 54 percent more than just 18 months ago. The shift to jails has put the squeeze on counties, some of which warn they can't handle additional bodies. And the numbers are rising: The state's total inmate population, about 18,000 at present, is expected to hit 22,000 by decade's end, due largely to arrests in the illegal drug trade. Fletcher must show where he will reroute the rising river of felons if not to Elliott County, critics say. Spots desired for every felon Crime-fighters, including Cynthia Gale Cook, president of the Kentucky Association of Commonwealth's Attorneys, say prisons continue to be necessary to hold the repeat offenders who cause most of the trouble. They say they understand the fiscal pressure in Frankfort to find cheaper penal alternatives. But even some of Fletcher's more progressive initiatives, such as expanding drug courts to help addicted felons, won't eliminate the need for bed space. Many drug-court participants flunk out and have to serve their original prison sentences. "When we have everyone in prison who needs to be there, then we can talk about privatization and leasing out beds for revenue," said Cook, a felony prosecutor in Calloway County. For Democratic legislators, particularly those in this impoverished region of northeast Kentucky, an even bigger concern is local job creation. If the state operates the Elliott County prison, it's expected to hire 280 people to work in the guard tower, kitchen, cell blocks and offices, starting at $20,000 to $22,000 a year, nearly twice the local per capita income. The health insurance and state pensions would be icing on the cake. However, a private operator, to earn a profit, is going to spend less than the government. That means fewer employees, lower pay and stingier benefits, all inside a brand-new facility generously provided by taxpayers, said House Majority Floor Leader Rocky Adkins, who lives in Sandy Hook. "The Department of Corrections said we needed this prison. Elliott County overwhelmingly accepted it," Adkins said recently while he toured the prison. "Now I think the state has something of a commitment to the people here to open this place and to run it." Residents Waiting For Their Jobs People in Sandy Hook admit a prison isn't the cheeriest place to work. But it might be all they get anytime soon. Unemployment in Elliott County topped 14 percent in May, the second-highest rate in the state, according to the Kentucky Department for Employment Services. True unemployment is probably worse; the agency counts only people who looked for work in the past month. "This prison could be a good deal for us," said Ron Stamper, 26, an occasional carpet installer, as he smoked a cigarette outside the courthouse on Main Street. "It'd be better if it had been a factory. But you know, there's really no jobs here other than the schools and family businesses," Stamper said. "You look for a place to put an application in, you're wasting your time." So the town waits for January, when the medium-security Little Sandy Correctional Complex is scheduled to finally open its gates -- or, more accurately, to finally shut them. Rural Kentucky has counted on incarceration for jobs for generations. Poor counties battled to claim new state prisons. Elliott County started its lobbying campaign for this prison nearly 20 years ago, under Gov. Wallace Wilkinson, ultimately beating out Knott County in 1998. U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, a Republican, helped bring several federal prisons to southeast Kentucky, which he represents. The Economic Development Cabinet -- led, then and now, by Secretary Gene Strong -- has cheered prison construction. It held a workshop in 2000 to teach companies how to "cash in on a portion of the $100 million business opportunity that will soon be up for grabs" as a federal prison was built in McCreary County. But Fletcher, at the Capitol, said this has become an outmoded way of thinking. Kentuckians can do better, he said. "That's not the type of economic development we need to be looking at for the future of Kentucky," the governor said. "I just don't want this state to have the reputation of being a state that builds its economy on building prisons and incarcerating its citizens." Warden Wants His Chance Perhaps no one is more curious about the new prison's fate than Gary Beckstrom. On Nov. 1, Beckstrom arrived in Sandy Hook as then-Gov. Paul Patton's choice for warden. Days later, voters elected Fletcher to replace Patton. On Dec. 1, Beckstrom said, he took a phone call from Fletcher's team. Had he ordered furniture and supplies for the prison, at that point set to open in June? Yes, he replied. Put that on hold for now, the caller said, because there might be some changes in the works. Seven months later, Beckstrom describes himself as "the only warden in Kentucky without a staff, or any inmates for that matter." He wanders through empty cellblocks, watching as construction crews put finishing touches to the interior. If the prison is privatized, he'll be reassigned. Privatization isn't guaranteed, however, said Rees, the corrections commissioner. The Corrections Department is finalizing a request for proposals for the Elliott County prison -- as well as a request for privatization proposals for the prison system's food-service program -- and a lot of details need to be resolved, he said. But the Elliott County deal could work one of two ways, said Rees, a former vice president for business development at Corrections Corporation of America, the nation's largest private prison operator. The state could lease the new prison to a company like CCA, which already runs three prisons in Kentucky. The state would collect rent while the company, in turn, leased out the beds to hold other states' inmates. Or the state could offer a management contract, paying a company to run the prison and hold Kentucky inmates in some of its beds more cheaply than the Corrections Department could. Remaining beds still could be leased out. If Kentucky chooses to have a company manage its prison and hold some state inmates, the target price would be $35 daily for each inmate, Rees said. Right now, the Corrections Department pays an average of $46 daily for each inmate in state prisons. Beckstrom said if the Fletcher administration gave him the chance, he, too, could run the new Elliott County prison at $35 an inmate each day because of the facility's modern technology and design. People forget that the state's $46 average is inflated by two costly maximum-security prisons, including a Death Row, and some prisons that date back to the 19th century, he said. Opposing privatization is an awkward stand for Beckstrom. He serves at Fletcher's pleasure. He worries that accidentally locking Lt. Gov. Steve Pence in a room last month, during a tour of the prison, probably didn't help his standing in Frankfort. The state's No. 2 ultimately escaped by crawling out a window. But Beckstrom also is a 27-year veteran of the Corrections Department, and he said the state should be in the business of running its own penal system. "I don't aim to be second-best in anything," he said. "The state can do this if it gives itself the chance." - --- MAP posted-by: Beth