Outlaw Town

Southwest Ranches ICE Jail Cancelled

By Stefan Kamph Fri., Jun. 15 2012 at 7:49 PM
Categories: Outlaw Town
prisonville-cover.jpg
On a day when President Obama announced that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will take steps to stop deporting people who came to the U.S. illegally as children, there's more big news on immigration close to home.

ICE has issued a press release to the media, as reported by Local 10 and other outlets, that it's pulled its plans to build a detention center in Southwest Ranches. From the release:

ICE has reevaluated its need for an additional detention facility in South Florida and has decided that it will no longer pursue a facility in the Town of Southwest Ranches. We are examining our options for additional detention space in the region and will make the appropriate notifications when a decision about the way forward has been made.


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Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Jeff Nelson, Keith Poliakoff, Southwest Ranches
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Outlaw Town

Debbie Wasserman Schultz Faces Increased Scrutiny on Immigration-Jail Support

By Stefan Kamph Mon., Apr. 23 2012 at 7:00 AM
Categories: Outlaw Town
Thumbnail image for 398px-Debbie_Wasserman_Schultz,_official_portrait,_112th_Congress.jpg
There's been a bunch of news about the proposed immigration detention center in Southwest Ranches over the past week or so, but none of it has been substantive information about, say, whether the contract is actually going through after ICE's weird about-face last month.

As a reminder, that's when ICE officials reportedly called Debbie Wasserman Schultz's office and said they had taken Southwest Ranches out of the running, then called back a few minutes later to say "Never mind." What happened in those few minutes is not publicly known.

But Wasserman Schultz, who cosigned a letter last year in support of the facility and has not announced a change in her stance, is facing increased scrutiny -- partially because of a video produced by a local immigrants' rights group, which you'll find after the jump.
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Corrections Corporation of America, David Shapiro, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Florida Immigrant Rights Coalition, ICE Detention Facility, Southwest Ranches, The Daily Caller
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Outlaw Town

Did ICE Bail on a Southwest Ranches Detention Facility, Then Backpedal? Sure Looks That Way

By Stefan Kamph Mon., Apr. 2 2012 at 12:36 PM
Categories: Outlaw Town
Thumbnail image for cca-badge.jpg
​Your humble Southwest Ranches ICE jail correspondent was on vacation last week, coincidentally on a tour of Civil Rights-era landmarks in the Deep South, when news broke that ICE had decided not to pursue a detention facility on a plot owned by CCA in Southwest Ranches.

But about 90 minutes later, that news unbroke. The office of U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, which had called officials with Pembroke Pines and Southwest Ranches as well as an antiprison activist with news of the cancellation, called back to say the information was premature.

It appears that Wasserman Schultz's office got a heads-up from ICE about a cancellation, then got a call back with word that the deal was still on. What happened at ICE headquarters in those 90 minutes, and what calls were made between that agency and the lawyers at CCA to set the record straight, we may never know. More »

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Charlie Dodge, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, ICE Detention Facility, Keith Poliakoff, Pembroke Pines, Southwest Ranches
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Outlaw Town

BREAKING: CCA Sues Pembroke Pines in Federal Court

By Stefan Kamph Thu., Mar. 8 2012 at 9:55 AM
Categories: Outlaw Town
Thumbnail image for cca-ice-meeting-4.jpg
Pines Mayor Frank Ortis (bottom) faced off with Southwest Ranches, ICE, and CCA officials in November. Now CCA is suing his city for failing to provide services to the proposed lockup.
​Well, that was quick. Pembroke Pines commissioners voted last night to rescind a contract to provide fire, EMS, water, and sewer services to Southwest Ranches, in opposition to a planned ICE detention facility being proposed by Corrections Corporation of America.

CCA responded immediately with a hefty lawsuit, filed late last night. Southwest Ranches Town Attorney Keith Poliakoff just sent us this federal complaint, after the jump:

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Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Keith Poliakoff, lawsuit, Pembroke Pines City Commission
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Outlaw Town

Pembroke Pines Commission Cancels Fire/EMS/Water Contract, Creating Roadblock for ICE Jail

By Stefan Kamph Thu., Mar. 8 2012 at 12:01 AM
Categories: Outlaw Town
cca-ice-meeting-7.jpg
Well, Pines government pretty much agrees.
​Planners and lawyers at the Corrections Corporation of America are going to show up for work this morning with a significant task ahead of them: figuring out how to provide water, sewer, and emergency services to the ICE detention facility they want to build in Southwest Ranches. They were counting on Pembroke Pines, which last year signed a pretty hefty contract to provide those services -- including a clause to provide more than a million bucks' worth of water, which one commissioner said she didn't know she had voted on.

Pines commissioners moved 3-2 last night to cancel that contract, and they also voted to find some way for the 14 firefighters hired to fulfill it to keep their jobs.

As a result, there was an interesting sight in the chambers: smiles on the faces of the usually angry anti-CCA activists. This was a big night, because the Pines contract was, if not vital, very important to the construction of the facility. This may be the most tangible achievement of the opposition movement so far, and judging from commissioners' acknowledgments, they really did have a lot to do with it.
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Angelo Castillo, Bill Di Scipio, Corrections Corporation of America, Frank Ortis, ICE Detention Facility, Iris Siple, Jay Schwartz, Keith Poliakoff, Pembroke Pines City Commission, Southwest Ranches
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Outlaw Town

Prisonville: Southwest Ranches Lawsuit Dismissed; Pembroke Pines to Vote on Controversial Contract

By Stefan Kamph Wed., Mar. 7 2012 at 8:55 PM
Categories: Outlaw Town
Thumbnail image for prisonville-cover.jpg
Update 8:53 p.m.: Motion to terminate the Fire/EMS contract with town of Southwest Ranches has been passed. This cancels the previous agreement for the city to service the town, including the proposed prison, and to provide water and sewer services. Developing...
--
​Two significant news items in the saga of resistance to the proposed ICE detention center in Southwest Ranches, chronicled earlier this year in our Prisonville, Fla story.

First, the Pembroke Pines City Commission meets again tonight to discuss canceling their agreement to provide fire, water, and emergency medical service to the planned facility -- which would be, at the very least, a huge pain in the ass for Southwest Ranches and prison contractor CCA.

Second, activist Bill Di Scipio's public-records lawsuit against the town has been dismissed by a judge.
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Bill Di Scipio, Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Pembroke Pines, Southwest Ranches
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Outlaw Town

CCA Threatens to Deprive Residents of Money if They "Reject" Immigration Detention Center

By Stefan Kamph Wed., Feb. 22 2012 at 11:10 AM
Categories: Outlaw Town
Thumbnail image for prisonville-cover.jpg
​Hey, remember that ICE detention facility that prison contractor CCA is trying to build in a remote exclave of Southwest Ranches? Opponents of the project are still raising hell.

For months, the people organizing the protests against the facility have been met with a rebuttal from town officials that it's already a done deal. When Pembroke Pines ramped up its opposition and started to consider canceling its agreement to provide water to the facility, they were told that CCA would just go ahead and drill its own well.

"The time to say you object? That was in the 1990s," Town Attorney Keith Poliakoff told us.

But the backlash appears to have set CCA's public relations department back on its heels -- the company is sending out astroturf mailers saying how much money stands to be lost "if we reject the South Florida Detention Center."

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Bill Di Scipio, Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Keith Poliakoff, Pembroke Pines City Commission, Southwest Ranches
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Outlaw Town

Sierra Club Formally Opposes Southwest Ranches Detention Center

By Stefan Kamph Thu., Feb. 9 2012 at 4:05 PM
Categories: Outlaw Town
ice-rendering.jpg
CCA rendering
Water hog?
​Along with agitated residents and the entire city government of Pembroke Pines, here's another addition to the list of opponents to the planned immigration detention facility in Southwest Ranches: the local branch of the Sierra Club.

The group released a formal resolution today opposing the construction of the roughly 1,500-bed facility by Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), saying it posed a threat to the region's water resources.

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Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Judy Kuchta, Mara Shlackman, Ron Bergeron, Sierra Club
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Outlaw Town

Pembroke Pines Is (Now) Pretty Damned Serious About Opposing the ICE Detention Center

By Stefan Kamph Thu., Feb. 2 2012 at 11:55 AM
Categories: Outlaw Town
prisonville-cover.jpg
​The Pembroke Pines City Commission may have spent years quietly voting in support of the development of CCA's proposed immigration detention facility in Southwest Ranches (read our feature here), but now the commission is going full steam ahead with vocally opposing its construction.

This is largely in response to public sentiment against the facility that has grown in recent months (though the Southwest Ranches town attorney says the opponents are a small minority).

Now Pines residents have elected two commissioners who oppose the facility, and last night the commission reviewed a resolution of opposition and agreed to send a letter to President Obama. Yeah, you read that right. More »

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Angelo Castillo, Barack Obama, cop beating, Corrections Corporation of America, ICE Detention Facility, Iris Siple, Jay Schwartz, Pembroke Pines City Commission
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Outlaw Town

Southwest Ranches Detention Center Site to Lose Existing Prison as a Neighbor

By Stefan Kamph Wed., Jan. 25 2012 at 2:12 PM
Categories: Outlaw Town
broward-prison.jpg
​For years, an argument in favor of building a CCA-run prison on a plot owned by Southwest Ranches (see our massive feature on the project in last week's issue) has been that it was already sandwiched between a county dump and a women's prison.

Now, due to budget constraints, the state has announced that it's closing the Broward Correctional Institution, a 611-bed women's prison, on May 1. As for the landfill, it could eventually see more traffic if it's reopened to household waste.

If you drive west on Sheridan Street past the last subdivisions, near where the CCA facility will go, you might see a few female convicts out mowing the lawn on work detail.More »

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Broward Correctional Institution, Corrections Corporation of America, Department of Corrections, ICE Detention Facility, Southwest Broward Landfill, Southwest Ranches
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