IN IOWA, SOME PRISONERS ARE BEHIND BARNS

CLARION, Iowa -- Dripping sweat and dressed in a fluorescent orange
pullover, George Nelson, a prisoner doing time for theft, was not exactly
the kind of worker Wright County had in mind some 12 years ago when
officials provided $90,000 to help build a huge new egg factory.

The incentives were intended to provide jobs in a section of north-central
Iowa that had been battered by an agricultural depression that began in the
early 1980s.

But now Nelson and more than 40 other convicts from a state prison 60 miles
away are working at the egg factory. Most of them are paid $6 an hour, the
same as other employees. Virtually none of the money paid to the convicts
stays in Wright County, and county supervisors fear that low-paid prison
labor will depress wages throughout the county.

"As long as a company can get prison labor for $6, wages are going to
remain that way, and I think it's going to snowball to other jobs," said
Larry Olson, a member of the Wright County Board of Supervisors.

Olson said he and others in Wright County agree that prisoners should work
to pay part of their keep and make restitution to their victims. Iowa is
one of 38 states with "hard labor" laws for convicts.

The notion of making convicts work, however, became a lot less attractive
in Wright County this summer. When county supervisors learned of the plan
to employ state prisoners at the Boomsma egg-production factory southeast
of Clarion, they asked the Iowa Department of Corrections to reconsider.

The supervisors said they were worried about prisoners escaping and about
the economic effect of convict labor.

"The board believes that low unemployment in the area should lead to more
competitive wage scales," the supervisors said in a letter to the Iowa
Corrections Department. "Prisoners taking low-paying jobs rather than
allowing the market to adjust to competition is not a strong economic
development tool."

The protest notwithstanding, the first prisoners were bused 60 miles from
the state prison at Rockwell City and took their places on the Boomsma
egg-production line at the end of June.

Prison officials gave assurances that if any county resident wanted one of
the $6-an-hour jobs, he or she would have the right to replace an inmate.
The officials also promised not to let convict employment at the egg plant
exceed 100. The egg factory is one of four huge Boomsma plants in Wright
County; the plants have about 150 non-convict workers.

The idea of inmates working at private businesses is anathema to organized
labor.

"If prison labor is wrong in China, it's sure as hell wrong in Iowa," said
Mark Smith, president of the Iowa Federation of Labor. "Prisoners are being
used to hold down wages."

On a recent day, 22 prisoners wearing orange pullovers were working for
Boomsma in one of the four Wright County plants where more than 5 million
hens keep conveyor belts loaded with eggs destined for supermarkets and
fast-food restaurants. A similar number of prisoners work a separate
10-hour shift.

The prisoners pack eggs, pull dead hens from their cages, sweep, clean and
help with other maintenance chores. They receive the same pay as other
Boomsma employees, many of whom are immigrants from Mexico.

Ricardo Herrera, 32, who is about halfway through a 10-year prison term for
drunken driving and possession of marijuana, said he welcomed the chance to
work away from the Rockwell City prison and earn a little money.

After taxes, a charge for board and room at the prison and other
deductions, he earns about $1.20 an hour for himself--much better, he said,
than the $3.50 a day he was getting for working in the kitchen and mowing
grass at the prison.

In addition, Herrera said, holding a job in the egg plant probably will
help him when he is considered for parole. "It's going to show I'm somewhat
responsible and can keep a job," he said. "It gives us a chance to show
we're not a serious threat to society."

Iowa prison officials say that about 200 men and women in state prisons are
working for wages in private business.

The best jobs are held by about 20 inmates at the Mt. Pleasant prison who
work as welders for a company that makes industrial equipment.

In all cases, the officials say, private employers who hired inmates tried
to fill the jobs from the civilian workforce, a difficult task in a state
where unemployment is virtually non-existent. The officials say that
inmates are being paid the prevailing private-industry wage for similar
work.

W.L. Kautzky, state prison director, said the department is merely
following through on a directive from the Iowa Legislature that inmates
work 40 hours a week. "It's the law in Iowa," he said.

Kautzky also said that if Iowa's economy were to falter, prison labor would
be withdrawn quickly from private employers: "If the economy goes south,
these jobs are history. We're transitional labor at best."

Roger Baysden, Kautzky's deputy, said that nationally about 2,600 state
prison inmates work for private employers. He said inmate employment helps
cover board and room, victim restitution and, in some cases, child support.

Inmates also pay taxes, and, Baysden said, private employment appears to be
a valuable step in helping convicts make the eventual transition to life on
the outside. "If we just keep doing what we've done in the past, all we're
going to do is build more prisons."

Baysden said employers like prison labor in part because the workers,
accompanied by guards, show up on time.

Julie Glessner, human resources director for Boomsma, said the company
tried to fill its labor needs first with county residents and then with
immigrant workers. In response to assertions that the company should simply
start paying higher wages, Glessner said, "If we did, we'd be out of
business."

Besides, Glessner said, state labor officials came to Boomsma seeking jobs
for the prisoners, rather than the company soliciting the state for
workers. She also discounts the county supervisors' worries about security
problems.

The inmates working at the egg factory, she said, are low-risk inmates who
often are closing in on the end of their prison terms.

"They've got way too much to risk to run off," she said.

Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)