October 14, 2009
Private Prisons: Development Scheme
Hardin, Mont., population 3,500, is just 15 miles northwest of the Little Bighorn Battlefield, a national monument honoring the hundreds of U.S. soldiers and Cheyenne and Lakota Indians who died in 1876 fighting over this now largely forgotten land. With unemployment above 10 percent and the county's poverty rate at twice the national average, Hardin's town leaders have long been desperate to create jobs and fuel economic development. As with many hard-luck towns in the dusty Northern Plains, these days, the only thing anyone passes through Hardin for is a glimpse of the distant past.
So when a group of private investors, represented by out-of-state brokerage firms, agreed to finance a private prison in Hardin in 2006, it seemed like a no-brainer to the town's economic-development arm, the Two Rivers Authority. A private prison developer had approached state officials in 2004, seeking work in the state, and was later referred to Hardin by the state's Commerce Department, according to Paul Green, who headed the Two Rivers Authority at the time. Around the time Hardin began talks with the prison developer, the state was projecting dramatic growth in its prison population, a fact Hardin economic-development officials say they weighed when they decided to move forward with the deal…
LINK - NewsWeek.com
