CCA & GEO Group Propose More ICE Detention Facilities

Once again I have to ask why we are wasting our money housing immigrants instead of spending the money sensibly to stem the tide at the border? Why can we not deport the ones already here in an expedient manner instead of forcing citizens to bear the cost of housing them while deportation cases drag on for months and years? This is what we are putting our great-grandchildren in debt to pay for?? Outrageous!

By Beth Brelje

Pocono Record Writer

December 07, 2010

A well-developed plan for a massive Pike County federal detention center is one of three finalists being considered by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, according to county Commissioner Harry Forbes.

Two other proposed locations — in York County, Pa., and Essex County, N.J. — are being considered for the 2,256-bed center to house illegal immigrants, Forbes said. The winning location may be announced in the next two weeks.

A similar proposal by a different prison provider, GEO Group, to place such a center in Northampton County was recently scrapped.

In Pike County, officials are partnering with Corrections Corporation of America, a large national private prison provider. CCA and Pike officials presented plans to federal authorities on Oct. 22, Forbes said.

Between 450 and 600 jobs would be created locally if the detention center is placed in Pike. Immigration officials would transfer an additional 200 workers to the Pike facility, according to Forbes.

CCA-drawn indoor and outdoor renderings show the proposed facility would dwarf the existing Pike County Correctional Facility on a bordering lot. The detention center would be at the corner of Route 739 and Pike County Boulevard in Blooming Grove Township.

Nationally, CCA houses approximately 75,000 offenders and detainees in more than 60 facilities, with a total bed capacity of more than 80,000, according to its website. The company, which is more than 25 years old, partners with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, the U.S. Marshals Service and Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as states and local municipalities.

Read More...

Bidding Up GEO Group and ICE Contract

This couldn't possibly have anything to do with all of GEO Group's pending ICE contracts or the appointment of a GEO Group lobbyist to head up the US Marshall's Service which awards contracts for privately run detention facilities now could it? Nah...I'm sure there are no backroom deals going on and that the timing of this is just pure coincidence...
From Benzinga

Posted on 11/10/10 at 1:58pm by Chip Brian
Geo Group is in SmarTrend's Security industry and this industry is currently in an Uptrend according to our research. We are monitoring many other stocks on the move within this industry.
SmarTrend currently has shares of Geo Group in an Uptrend and issued the Uptrend alert on June 17, 2010 at $21.57. The stock has risen 16.9% since the Uptrend alert was issued.

Read more: http://www.benzinga.com/press-releases/10/11/c599265/investors-bid-up-shares-of-geo-group-up-1-geo#ixzz15O89nsLj

Geo Group's Pending ICE Contracts

Now that GEO Group has succeeded in putting one of their spokesmen/puppeteers in place as head of the US Marshall's Service, they have a stronger chance of winning the *bid* for this contract...and many others as well. Small communities everywhere should be aware and not fall for the ruse of corrections for profit as a money saving endeavor. Communities who have fallen for it have paid a pretty hefty price in many cases.

From
By Beth Brelje

Pocono Record Writer

November 15, 2010 

GEO Group, formerly known as Wackenhut, wants to build and operate the detention center in Upper Mount Bethel Township, Northampton County. The operator says the center would house 2,250 illegal immigrants awaiting deportation. The project, the company says, would provide 350 construction jobs and 500 permanent jobs.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has announced an interest in securing additional detention space in the Northeast, said ICE spokesman Mark Medvesky. Ideally, a detention system would reduce transfers and house people near the site of their apprehension, and close to legal services and hospitals.

"Counties, along with private companies with whom they may choose to partner, are drafting concept papers for ICE's consideration. These concept papers, developed by local jurisdictions, are not binding on ICE," Medvesky said in an e-mail to the Pocono Record. "No sites for the northeastern U.S. have been selected and no intergovernmental service agreements have been awarded."

Story Continues -

What if GEO Group doesn't get a contract from ICE, or decides to leave after the center is built?

"In Littlefield, Texas, the municipality had to dip into reserves to cover payments for about $1.2 million in bonds and other debt used to finance the Bill Clayton Detention Center," Smart Money magazine reported in September. "The bonds were issued in 2000, but the expected revenue stream evaporated when, after a prisoner suicide in 2008, the 310-bed private prison lost its contract to house out-of-state inmates. In 2009, GEO Group ended its operating agreement with the detention center, leaving it unoccupied."

In Pueblo, Colo., GEO Group initially promised to fund the building of a private prison for 500 state inmates and later demanded repeated changes in the deal. GEO wanted government financing and changed the size of the proposed prison.

"GEO demanded more money. It wanted either more money per inmate, or a revenue guarantee that amounted to $1 billion over 30 years for two prisons," according to a 2006 report by the Rocky Mountain News."

For more information about the impact of the proposed facility and for more background on GEO Group Read Full Article

Prison Corporation Looking to Take Advantage of Small PA Community

Folks in PA had best be aware of GEO Group. They are slick salesmen, always promising jobs to help the community but never making small communities aware that prisons do not help at all, but rather, only cause harm. Who will take their kids to vacation anywhere near a town with a prison? Care to stay at a Holiday Inn next door to a detention center? Build a school nearby? Start up a small local business?

Truth is that in community after community across the US, GEO Group has done nothing but kill industry and cause harm to local residents. The jobs they bring in are not for everyone and force residents to settle for working a job in which they risk their lives everyday while receiving minimal training, little protection and are often forced to work multiple shifts because the company is too cheap to hire enough staff to cover all shifts. They don't like to pay benefits so why hire more than just the bare minimum to keep a facility running?

Then of course, there is the issue of lawsuits - of which GEO Group has plenty racked up. Abuses, escapes, murders...gosh, what community wouldn't want such a wonderful employer in their midst?

Finally, citizens should realize that at any time, GEO Group can choose to not renew their contract and then the township will be forced to either purchase the facility from GEO (at a hefty mark up price), be forced to allow another prison corporation like CCA (you know, the guys responsible for letting convicts escape from an AZ facility who then went on to murder a couple on vacation in NM) or at the very least, get stuck with a huge empty eyesore in their town that no one has use for.

From an article in The Morning Call -

Calabrese, the vice chairman and president of Florida's GEO Group, gave a 45-minute presentation Wednesday night about his company's idea for an inmate detention center just south of the Portland Industrial Park in Upper Mount Bethel Township.

Now, take note of the doublespeak in this next paragraph where first he states they aren't actually housing criminals - in spite of the fact that anyone who enters this country ILLEGALLY is technically a CRIMINAL. 

Calabrese stressed that the inmates — the facility would hold 2,250 — would not be serving time because of crimes they committed but because they're illegal immigrants awaiting deportation. However, the majority of them will have committed felonies and already served time in a prison, Calabrese said.

Slick, isn't he? More from the article - 

On the flip side, Calabrese said the detention center would create 500 jobs, many of them paying $35,000 to $40,000 a year with benefits included. On top of that, Calabrese said, the community would benefit from construction and supply expenses and tax revenue paid by GEO. Annual operation would call for about $37 million worth of labor, goods and services.

He fails to mention that GEO will demand huge tax breaks from the county and state so revenue from taxes generated will not come from them. The $37 million in labor, goods and services will be supplied by other corporations like Aramark and will not come from within the state or local community and therefore, provides zero benefits for residents.

The article ends with -

Before the facility could come to Upper Mount Bethel, Northampton County must have a contract with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to take on the responsibility to detain people in the United States illegally. After being contacted by GEO, Northampton County Council voted Oct. 21 to allow Executive John Stoffa to begin talks about a contract, which the county could then subcontract to the GEO Group or another company.
The county could risk violating competitive bidding laws if it appears the company was chosen without a public selection process, or without proof that the county can't find anyone else to provide the service.

In plain English, that means that GEO is looking to build a facility BEFORE there is a need and BEFORE they've won any contract with ICE. They are building a facility where the need for one DOES NOT EXIST. End result will be that the residents will be housing criminals shipped in from across the country and who will do nothing more than contaminate their community. I hope the people of this township stick to their resolve and kick GEO Group officials clean out of their county - or better yet, out of their state entirely.