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| Montana Corrections Dept. to Ask OK for Private Prison Plan |
| By Great Falls Tribune |
| Published: 10/28/2002 |
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Montana's Corrections Department will ask legislators next session for permission to accept out-of-state inmates in private prisons, Director Bill Slaughter said Thursday. The Corrections Advisory Council, meeting in Miles City, unanimously approved the change Thursday. 'They didn't want us to draw the numbers down so much we'd lose the facilities,' Slaughter said. Last month, the company running the private prison in Shelby warned state officials that it might have to close down if too many state inmates were pulled out. Slaughter said legislation could be drafted by Corrections Corp. of America, which runs Shelby's Crossroads Correctional Center. 'They (the advisory committee) want us to go forward and assist whoever is going to draft that bill so we can put in some safeguards to protect the public,' Slaughter said in a phone interview Thursday evening. Under the governor's budget-cutting directive, the state Corrections Department has been releasing some prisoners early and pulling others out of Crossroads and other regional prisons. Slaughter said his department had expected to end this fiscal year overspending its budget by $9 million. 'The good news is that it looks as though that has been cut to $4.6 million,' he said. That's critical, he said, because, 'they informed us there is no additional money in the general fund.' The DOC will ask legislators next session to fund a 5 percent growth in the prison system, he said. |
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