According to yesterday's Portland Press Herald, Sen. Douglas Thomas (R-Piscataquis County) has introduced a bill that would authorize a private prison in the Piscataquis County town of Milo. According to Thomas, the prison would provide much needed jobs for the distressed community of 2,400.
Unfortunately, based on their abysmal record in other states, the Corrections Corporation of America might end up costing Maine much more in the form of lawsuits over the use of excessive force, negligence and lack of adequate medical care.
Here are just two recent examples from Idaho and Texas.
Of course, it's not only about dollars and cents. Corporations have only one motive, profit, and the only way to feed that bottom line is to incarcerate more people and to eliminate much needed services. That's very different from the mission of the Maine Department of Corrections: "to reduce the likelihood that juvenile and adult offenders will re-offend, by providing practices, programs and services which are evidence-based and which hold the offenders accountable."
