Prison board endorses takeover of NLV facility

Wednesday, June 9, 2004 | 8:50 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Gov. Kenny Guinn says allowing a private company to run the state women's prison in North Las Vegas has not worked.

Guinn's statement came as the state Board of Prisons, of which he is chairman, endorsed the plan of the state Department of Corrections to take over the prison when Corrections Corporation of America pulls out Oct. 1 when its contract expires.

It will be more costly for the state to run the Southern Nevada Women's Correctional Facility than any of the three private companies that submitted bids to replace CCA.

Corrections Department Director Jackie Crawford said the low bids by the private companies would not allow them to manage the prison effectively.

"We felt the vendors were set up for failure," she told the prison board Tuesday.

The department estimates it will need $633,000 in start-up costs and $10.5 million a year to take care of 462 inmates.

That is more than $1 million higher than the bids of the private companies. But Crawford said none of the private companies wanted to provide medical care and that health care would have fallen on the state, meaning a fractured system.

Darrel Rexwinkel, assistant director for finance in the department, said the state would save $850,000 on medical costs compared to what the private companies would have had to spend, reducing the cost differences between the state and the private companies.

The state Purchasing Division received proposals from Civigenics Inc., of Marlborough, Mass., Cornell Cos. of Houston, Texas and Management and Training Corp. of Centerville, Utah.

Corrections Corp. of America, which built and has operated the 500-inmate Southern Nevada Women's Facility since it opened in 1997, has decided it does not want to renew its contract for financial reasons. Its contract expires Oct. 1.

Rexwinkel said the start-up costs include training all the officers so they are certified before Oct. 1.

Rexwinkel and Crawford also said that if more inmates were assigned to the North Las Vegas prison the move would drive up the cost the state would pay the private company, as the contracts call for a daily per-inmate charge.

Rexwinkel and Crawford said the state system could absorb those added inmates at only a fraction of what the private companies proposed.

The final approval for the state to take over the prison must come from the Legislative Interim Finance Committee that meets June 16.

Guinn said there were concerns about the private companies' abilities to provide inmate health care when those costs are rising 15 to 18 percent per year. There were no contract provisions to cover the escalating costs in the contracts of the private companies.

He said he was worried they would have to cut back in other areas.

Crawford said the starting salary for a correctional officer working for the state is $33,000 plus benefits worth an additional 42 percent of the salary. The private companies planned to hire correctional officers at $27,000 with a 20 percent benefit package.

She doubted the private companies could hire enough competent correctional officers given the competitive salaries in Clark County. She said she has trouble employing and keeping officers because of the higher pay of local governments.

Crawford also said a private company would have trouble running a full-scale prison with a range of inmates. The North Las Vegas prison has "multi-classification" ranging from a death row inmate to those in minimum custody.

"This is not the population to privatize," she said of the inmates who've been under private supervision since the prison opened.