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Senate kills attempt to privatize Florida's prisons

By Palm Beach Business.com

TALLAHASSEE — The Florida Senate on Tuesday narrowly defeated a bill that would have turned over the keys to almost all state prisons to private contractors.

Passage of the bill, which has been supported by Gov. Rick Scott, would have been boon to private prison firms, including Boca Raton’s GEO Group and Corrections Corp. of America, two of the industry’s biggest players. Only the prisons where the death penalty is administered would have continued to be run by state Department of Corrections. Final vote: 19 in favor, 21 against.

Proponents argued the move would save the state money — the bill included a requirement to cut cost of operating the system by 7 percent.

“Those dollars we can put into education,” Sen. Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando, said. “Those are dollars we can put into health care. The alternative is to raise taxes.”

But opponents argued that the savings were far from a sure thing. They also argued that operating prisons was a fundamental responsibility of the state that should not be handed off to private industry no matter the potential savings.

“This is the largest private expansion in the country,” said Sen. Miguel de la Portilla, R-Miami. “This is a bigger gamble than some of the gaming bills we have considered.”

Florida began privatizing its system in 1989 and expanded private involvement in 1995. Altogether seven prisons are now under private management, and proponents based their savings projections based on those operations.

De la Portilla said those projections were flawed.

Florida has the third-largest prison system in the country, with 101,000 inmates housed in 62 facilities, manned by 28,000 employees with an annual budget of $2.18 million.

 

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