Selling a Private Prison to Lawmakers: A Primer in Three Acts, by Southwest Ranches and CCA

what a bunch of corrupt elected officials we have here in flori"da". www.browardoutrage.com

Pines votes 4-1 to support and effectively gives full support to CCA Facility.  Party Over!

the legitimacy of this controversy seems to be justified by the amount of people outright denying and poo-pooing any and all arguments in the comments. may the money your masters hoped to reap from the human suffering to take place at this facility burn to ash.

The fact is ......

1)  if you talk to most people living in the area 10 years of more, they had never heard of plans to put a prison out there.  Somehow all news of easements, SFWMD conflicts, BSO contract changes, road widenings, town celebrations was all well publicized and even discussed in Monthly newsletters.   Yet if you interview the residents, most all say the same thing .... "first learned of this early this year" ....... AFTER the one and only PUBLIC MEETING on November 10, 2010.

2) Quite often in these small town deals, there is a failure for the Town to cover all the bases and be sure they have protected themselves from "Hollywood Accounting".  The result ..... do some research and you will find that most often, small towns that ink these deals thinking they are going to reap big financial rewards, NEVER SEE half of the money they thought they would see. Years later after they are asking the question . "How did this happen, it was not supposed to work this way".Simple example --  NPDES Stormwater Permits, Florida Everglades impact surveys, etc... are required by the Fed for this kind of building.

The simple question was raised a week ago asking of this had been taken into consideration by the Town so that CCA is obligated to cover such costs by contract.If not, and a future EPA audit and/or engineering is required, it would fall back on the Town/County to cover those costs. 

Surprise ............ it was discovered that it had NOT been done !

The ramifications ?

A simple real world example.......... Up North ,  a small town inked a deal with Wal-Mart.The Wal-Mart came in, built a superstore and massive parking lot.The stormwater (rain water) run off started flooding a nearby residential section and flowing hundreds of thousands of gallons of water into the nearby major river.

EPA came in and inquired about the NPDES permit and how they runoff was going to be either contained and treated or the location re-engineered.

The small Town with their glazed eyes focused on the dangling carrot of easy tax money had never written that consideration into the contract.The Wal-Mart was Not obligated to cover those costs.

So now the end result ?The Town/County must pay the $2.8 million is costs to deal with this problem.Considering the $300,000 in annual tax revenue they thought they were going to see, they are now going to see NOTHING for almost 9.5 years because they have to spend all that $$$$ for this.

3) People seem to have disregard for these issues and figure it is not a problem as long as it is not in their backyard.  (Roxette here).     The reality is we still have enough open & isolated land in America  such that NOBODY should have to have these types of facilities in their neighborhoods.   And YES, despite what the media would have you think, this prison site is surrounded on three sides by homes that are 0.1 - 0.2 miles away.

It is easy to find locations 2-5 miles remote from residential areas.

It is only private shady deals (political and personal) that results in even having the nutty idea of putting a prison 1/4 mile away from $1 million homes when 35-45 minutes away are thousands of isolated and cheaper acreages of land in isolated remote areas.

4) Public Support ?Where was the Ballot question and voting ?It would have been easy enough any time over the past few years to offer the residents a choice in options for handling the Town's tax revenue  situation if the town council were real leaders and cared about truly representing the people .....Example -In order to meet the town's revenue needs would you prefer .(a)  Expanding the existing Landfill for increased revenue ?(b) Pay $890 per household more per year in Property Taxes ?(c) Allow the building and operation of an CCA managed ICE Detention Center for Illegals ?

5)  If the USA was serious about dealing with Illegal immigration and establishing some Zero tolerance to stop the problem instead of doing things like suing its own States who try to deal with it, there would already be a clear message that illegal entry to the USA would not be tolerated and would be met with SEVERE actions and enforcements.In that case, the flood of people who now keep coming would have trickled down considerably and there would be no need for more facilities such as this.

Seriously, there is something very suspect in how the Fed refuses to deal with illegal immigration to deter it with strong force, yet is happy enough to keep building more and more facilities such as this to "process:" people.There are now five (5) new ILLEGAL Detention Centers in various stages of construction aboud the USA today.

Is the Fed trying to artificially create a new industry base ?

Etc..etc..etc..

This article is pretty poor and definitely not up to the Pulp standard. Norman's log in must be rolling over in its digital grave.

In any case, this article highlights one of the downsides of the sunshine laws. Anyone can make a public records request and use official correspondence to spin a story in any direction   they choose, particularly at New Times where there is no editorial accountability. Maybe an email can be found in some government archive that was sent to Attila, another to an Asian named Hun. From there Stefan can erroneously link the two and write that Attila the Hun is back, Kansan can swear to it, and  Di Scipio can gather the house fraus and protest it; all claiming that Hun is on the take, and colluding with corrupt local officials.  

These emails are real but the "story" being written is not! What is true is that Ortis and Sipel both were aware of and voted on the agreements they are now rejecting. Hmm, its election season, both are in a qualifying period for their seats. Hmm, someone step up and challenge them rather than waste time protesting and doing public records requests. Throw the bums out!

It's clear to me that Nelson and Schultz got snookered into supporting an awful proposal that was sneaked by locals with no input from the community.  They did not have adequate information on the proposal before they lent their support.

I'm glad to hear that "seriously" will vote for each, because on balance, they've been very good representatives for Florida and the opposition would be a nightmare. He (?) is voting the right way for the wrong reason.

Who cares!!!! These stories are poorly written and are getting way old. There has to be something more important in this County going on.  Why not focus on the land fill out there.  This deal is happening no matter what, so we should look to the future and should make sure the final agreement protect us.  Glad to see that our elected leaders were actually working with CCA so that they knew what was going on.  Also, glad they met with the Congressional leaders first.  Nothing in this report is even remotely interesting or surprising.  This just wasted 5 minutes of my time to read and to try to make sense out of why this was even written.     

Schultz and West? Now there's a pair:

     Rep. Allen West, a first-term Republican from south Florida, wasn't shy about his online outburst. He sent his peppery email to numerous lawmakers as well as his target, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., the chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.The subject line of the email: "Unprofessional and Inappropriate Sophomoric Behavior from Wasserman Schultz."     The e-mail said: "Look, Debbie, I understand that after I departed the House floor you directed your floor speech comments directly towards me. Let me make myself perfectly clear, you want a personal fight, I am happy to oblige. You are the most vile, unprofessional and despicable member of the US House of Representatives. If you have something to say to me, stop being a coward and say it to my face, otherwise, shut the heck up."     In her remarks on the House floor, Wasserman Schultz said: "The gentleman from Florida, who represents thousands of Medicare beneficiaries, as do I, is supportive of this plan that would increase costs for Medicare beneficiaries. Unbelievable from a member from south Florida."

Schultz and Nelson should have known better.  West on the other hand knows which side his bread is buttered on.

I bet you roxete5015 is one of those SWR residents that wants "show me the money"!!!

to all of those saying they should have known.  Do you know what planning or zoning EVERY lot in your community or city has assign? I bet you not, and i bet Roxette5015 doesnt know either.  I bought a house in 2011 in Pembroke Pines.  I never knew there were plans to build a detention center or another prison because that land was part of another town.  Nobody wants you to know because if not the houses wouldnt sell.

Also the government is at fault, how the hell do you construct 9 schools in a 5 mile radius from this area knowing the zoning of the area. 

Im sorry Roxette5015 but we didnt know.  An SWR has kept this secret very well.  You should read the emails that we have seen coming from the rat attorney from SWR.  You would be surprise at how they were and are dealing with the situation.

This entire issue is ridiculous. The bottom line is that these people in the surrounding areas moved into this neighborhood with a PRISON, a DUMP, INDUSTRIAL LAND, and 2 PROPERTIES ZONED FOR PRISONS.  They should thank their lucky stars that they are getting a detention center and not a real prison, or garbage incinerator or something else much more offensive that the area is already zoned for.  What did they think would be built there - a park? Or a mall?  Who would send their kid to a park next to a prison and a dump?  Who would build a mall there?  It's ridiculous.

Corrections Corporation of America is an owner and operator of privatized correctional and detention facilities, and a prison operator in the United States. As of December 31, 2010, the Company operated 66 correctional and detention facilities, including 45 facilities that it owns, with a total design capacity of approximately 90,000 beds in 19 states and the District of Columbia. As of December 31, 2010, it was also constructing an additional 1,124-bed correctional facility in Millen, Georgia. It also owns two additional correctional facilities that it leases to third-party operators. The Company specializes in owning, operating, and managing prisons and other correctional facilities and providing inmate residential and prisoner transportation services for governmental agencies. Its facilities offer a range of rehabilitation and educational programs, including basic education, religious services, life skills and employment training, and substance abuse treatment.