Prison Profiteers

The other evening a poster went up from JPay, announcing the formation of a not-for-profit foundation, "Creative Corrections Education Foundation”. The poster states that 100,000s of children have a parent behind bars. "For the cost of a candy bar" an offender can make a $0.50 donation each month to the foundation in the hopes that $3 million will be raised to create scholarships for children of the incarcerated. How noble of JPay. Meanwhile, JPay gouges inmates' families for the "privilege" of sending money to their loved ones behind bars. JPay makes millions off sweetheart contracts negotiated with state DOC staff; they spend millions each election cycle to "buy" influence; and the state reps are more than happy to oblige. Sorry, but Mr. Smith ain't going to Washington anymore. Politics is about corrupt money influencing policy.

Were it only JPay doing this, you could write it off (no pun intended) to the state trying to simplify a process that--like everything else in prison-is long on time consumption and short on results. But it isn't just JPay. There is a prison-industrial complex that makes billions off the taxpayers of this state, this country and lines the pockets of politicians and CEOs alike. If the state believes in prison then so be it; but, don't outsource a fundamental government function. The loss of freedom is as massive and intrusive a power that the government has; they should not be allowed to sell that function off to the highest bidder for private profit.

Who is harmed by this prison profiteering? All inmates and their families, which, as we know, are mostly poor, uneducated people, people without a voice, people for whom the American dream is but a false myth.

Why does the state contract out phone service and charge inmates and their families more than a 20-minute call to an overseas location? Why does the state sign such a contract and then get a "commission" (a fancy word for kickback) on the contract? Why do we claim that we believe in the free market except where it relates to services for inmates and their families?

Funny questions to ask. Here are a few more: If it costs $27,000 a year to house and hold an inmate, how much of that is really cost attributable to the inmate? Answer, less than 5%. The rest is to support a VA DOC bureaucracy that has over 15,000 employees with salary, benefits, etc. Think those people are in favor of prison reform?

What does the state do with all the money it gets from contract commissions? It certainly isn't used for drug and alcohol programs; at the last general assembly, a state rep proposed that the phone commission be used specifically to fund prison re-entry and education programs. That bill was tabled. Interestingly, GTL-the phone profiteer--has a full time lobbyist at work at the Virginia General Assembly. Can you guess what GTL thought of the bill?

Prison profiteering is, besides being immoral, a waste of taxpayer money. It is wrong. Where is "Mr. Smith" when we need him? He’s probably on a golf junket with some prison contractor!