SEEING THE GOOD A PRISON COULD BRING

Joyce Scott recalls using a baseball bat to run drug dealers off the street
near her home in Southeast Washington. Among those at whom she swung: her
own son.

"He used to work for a fast-food restaurant, but then his girlfriend left
him for a drug dealer, so he started dealing drugs," Scott recalled. "I just
couldn't stand it. He was my heartbreak, so I became his nightmare, running
after him with a baseball bat."

The bat didn't help, though. Her son eventually went to Lorton Correctional
Complex in Virginia and returned to the District unrehabilitated. He became
a repeat offender. At 12:30 one morning in January, Scott received a
telephone call from D.C. General Hospital saying that her son had come in
screaming with five bullet wounds to
his upper body.

He survived. But it took such a near-death experience to get him to finally
go straight.

As far as Scott is concerned, that's cutting it way too close.

Now she wants to make sure that when District residents go to prison for
drug-related offenses, they will get the help they need. As executive
director of a group called Citizens for a Progressive Ward 8, Scott is
spearheading a grass-roots effort to bring what she hopes will be a
first-class correctional facility to Ward 8 in Southeast Washington.

This has pitted Scott, 47, who had to leave Ballou High School after
becoming pregnant with her son 29 years ago, against some of the most
well-heeled, well-educated and influential people in the Washington area.

Her opponents include D.C. Mayor Anthony A. Williams; Ward 8 community
activist Eugene Kinlow Jr., whose father is a member of the D.C. financial
control board; and a variety of environmentalists and no-growth advocates.

But Scott, who went on to receive a general equivalency diploma, is undaunted.

"I was invited to speak to the Green Party, and in the middle of my remarks,
this man stands up and hoists up his pants and says, 'The only reason she
wants this prison is because her son keeps getting locked up and she's just
mad,' " Scott recalled. "I was so outdone. I took three giant steps towards
him -- in the name of Jesus, of course -- and said, 'I can't think of a
better reason to be involved.' "

Scott has some powerful backers, too. The group seeking to build and manage
the prison -- if the District and federal governments approve -- is the
Corrections Corp. of America. John Ray, a former D.C. Council member, is the
corporation's legal counsel. Scott was Ray's Ward 8 coordinator during his
political campaigns.

"When I was first approached by CCA about locating a prison in Southeast,
the only thing I could see was Lorton, where my son had been, and that sent
my blood pressure up," Scott recalled. "I said, 'No, no, no.' "

But after being persuaded to visit a CCA-run facility in New Mexico, she
changed her mind.

"I have to tell you, I fell in love with the place," Scott recalled. "They
had a therapeutic drug treatment program, plus it was cleaner than a
hospital and more modern. The prison recreation room was better equipped
than anything at Ballou, with musical instruments and everything."

Current plans call for a 1,200-bed, minimum-security facility for adult male
felons near the Anacostia River. It would feature two prison industries and
a separate vocational school for Ward 8 residents.

Prison opponents, however, can be just as persuasive. They would rather have
a first-class high school or university in the ward. They also want a
supermarket and a movie theater, and they say they are tired of Southeast
Washington being a dumping ground for undesirable development.

To which Scott replies: "Let's be realistic: Universities, supermarkets and
movie theaters are not on the table. Only the Federal Bureau of Prisons has
come in with money to spend. So I say let's make the most of what they have
to offer."

To those who say that a prison in Ward 8 will lower property values and
cause middle-class residents to move out, Scott scoffs: Property values have
only risen throughout the city, including the neighborhoods around the D.C.
jail.

"What we have to realize is that sending people away to be warehoused in
other states only results in them returning to us meaner than junkyard
dogs," Scott said. "If you want to ship something out, make it crack cocaine
and firearms. Then you'll be doing something that makes a positive difference."

As formidable an advocate as Scott is, she still has a sore spot that her
adversaries like to home in on.

"How do you expect to help other people's children when you couldn't help
your own?" she was asked at one community forum.

The question hurts. Although Scott doesn't talk about it publicly, it
clearly bothers her that some would judge her harshly because her son got
caught up in drugs, even though the children of some of her critics also
have drug problems.

Instead of going to prison, however, the children of the well-to-do get sent
to expensive drug treatment facilities before they get into trouble with the
law. That inequity just makes Scott more determined.

"Out of my pain," she tells her critics, "I now have experience, strength
and hope to share, along with a sincere desire to help the least among us."