Southwest Ranches Has Pretty Parks and Horses; How About 1,800 Jailed Immigrants?
Categories: Immigration
For a while, there wasn't much public outcry about Southwest Ranches' proposal to woo the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), a for-profit prison contractor, to build an 1,800-bed immigrant detention facility at the edge of the Everglades. Yesterday, immigrants-rights advocates and local residents clustered at the intersection of Griffin and Dykes roads to denounce the town council's efforts to court the facility, as well as the proliferation of for-profit detention.
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| Stefan Kamph |
| Alejo Stark, a Davie resident and Brown University student. |
The planned facility would join several detention centers around the country for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Immigrants awaiting deportation are typically housed in dorm-like settings if they're not violent offenders or in more prison-like conditions if they are. ICE's facilities are generally run by one of the big two private prison contractors, CCA or the Geo Group.
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| Stefan Kamph |
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| Stefan Kamph |
Oh yeah, it's also home to the Broward Correctional Institution, a 753-bed women's prison that used to house Florida's female death row. Southwest Ranches' far western location and broad reach makes it a convenient place to plop down the facilities most South Floridians would rather pretend don't exist. CCA has owned a large plot of land adjacent to U.S. 27, at the edge of the Everglades, since 1998.
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| Stefan Kamph |
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| Stefan Kamph |
| Isabel Conoeban, of Students Working for Equal Rights at FAU. |
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