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| Alabama may send prisoners out of state |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 07/12/2001 |
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Alabama inmates may be shipped to other states due to the 'no vacancy' signs on Alabama's prisons and jails. Gov. Don Siegelman's administration will send out requests for proposals from both public and private prisons interested in housing Alabama inmates. The requests for proposals will likely go out this week, said Ted Hosp, the governor's legal adviser. 'We've got to solve the problem as quickly as we can,' Siegelman said recently. The administration is waiting to see whether Montgomery County Circuit Judge William Shashy will cite the state for contempt of court and levy fines for a long-standing backlog of state inmates in jam-packed county jails. The state agreed in 1998 to remove inmates from county jails within 30 days of them being sentenced to state prison. The state hasn't kept its agreement and is being sued by county commissions and sheriffs, who say they are tired of broken promises. Over the last month, the state prison system removed an average of 40 inmates per day from county jails, but they kept coming into county jails at an almost equal rate. As of last week, county jails held 1,707 state inmates who had been in the county lockups beyond the 30-day limit. Nothing is definite about whether Alabama would use out-of-state lockups, and Siegelman has said the state wouldn't pay more than the $26 per day it costs to keep an inmate in an Alabama prison. Alabama wouldn't be the first state to turn to other states to house an overflow of inmates. Corrections Corporation of America, the nation's largest corrections management company, currently provides that service for Alaska, Hawaii and Wisconsin, company spokesman Steve Owen said recently. 'We stand ready to assist Alabama any way we can,' Owen said. His Nashville-based company has an empty $45 million prison in McRae, Ga., in the southeastern part of the state. Several other companies provide similar services, and sheriffs in Texas and Louisiana have expressed an interest in housing Alabama prisoners, corrections officials said. Moving prisoners out of state would make it harder for inmates' families to visit and maintain contact. 'I don't give a rip,' Siegelman said recently. 'I have a duty to keep our streets safe and keep our jails safe and protect our correctional officers,' he said. |
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