PRISON CROWDING WILL FORCE MORE INMATES OUT OF STATE

With Committee's Action, Number Of Prisoners Sent Elsewhere Will Top 5,500

Madison - Wisconsin, which already leads the nation with 4,107 inmates in
out-of-state prisons, will spend $37.2 million to boost that number to
5,514 in the next two years, lawmakers decided Tuesday.

At the urging of Corrections Secretary Jon Litscher, the Legislature's
Joint Finance Committee approved the release of funding to help ease
overcrowding at state prisons.

"We are ready to go, and we need to. The urgency is there now," Litscher
said. "Our capacity issues are extreme. . . . We have a safety issue as we
are speaking."

The crowding is so serious that Litscher's agency plans to begin
transferring prisoners out of state next week. Buses already have been
scheduled to transport inmates out of state next Monday, Tuesday and Dec.
29, and more will depart the following week.

And officials warned legislators that shipping prisoners beyond Wisconsin's
borders is not likely to end any time soon. The Department of Corrections
expects it may need another 2,900 out-of-state beds by June 2001, based on
population estimates.

This time, the panel approved contracting for 2,060 prison beds, but 653 of
those will be used to transfer prisoners now housed in eight Texas county
jails to other states. Wisconsin plans to end its contract with the Texas
facilities by next June.

The action - which came on a 13-3 vote - significantly expands Wisconsin's
relationship with the Corrections Corporation of America, a private prison
operator. Of the 2,060 beds, 1,893 will go for male inmates at CCA facilities.

State Rep. Antonio Riley (D-Milwaukee) opposed adding more out-of-state
beds, saying the move is merely a means for state officials to avoid
tackling the overcrowding problem head-on.

"Maybe we need to be in a tough spot," Riley said. "Maybe then the
Legislature will do something to address the problem."

The move means that CCA will house 4,833 Wisconsin inmates in private
prison facilities in Tennessee, Minnesota, Oklahoma and Mississippi at a
cost of $42 a day per inmate. Lawmakers also approved 127 beds for female
inmates in a McLoud Correctional Services facility in Oklahoma and
additional 40 beds for women in Alderson, W.Va.

In addition, the committee approved spending $784,300 for six additional
employees to monitor contract compliance with prisons outside the state's
borders and 3.2 positions to staff a pair of "televisiting" sites at
Wisconsin prisons.

Those sites, at the Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage and the
Racine Correctional Institution in Sturtevant, will allow relatives and
attorneys to visit with out-of-state inmates through teleconferencing.

Riley said the state needs to come up with more alternatives, such as
leasing the private prison in Stanley, to keep inmates in Wisconsin.

"I voted to send inmates out of state, but I can't vote for the expansion,"
Riley said. "I hope we will look for realistic ways to offer some real help
in the state."

Also arguing against the measure was Sen. Gwendolynne Moore (D-Milwaukee),
who questioned CCA's ability to run a prison.

She cited a pair of incidents in which guards were attacked by prisoners at
the Whiteville, Tenn., facility and last month's hostage-taking incident at
the same prison while Litscher was visiting.

"I can't tell you how disturbed I am that the department would want to
contract with a company that has not demonstrated it can manage such a
facility," Moore said.