House Speaker Kris Steele and members of the House's Republican majority will unveil new proposals for modernizing state government and propping up the state's underfunded pension systems.

Steele and other GOP leaders plan a news conference Thursday to discuss the proposals. The Shawnee Republican has made government modernization and pension reform among his top priorities for the 2012 Legislature that convenes on Feb. 6...

A private prison in the western Oklahoma town of Sayre still does not have a cause it can release for a riot among inmates that occurred nearly two months ago, a spokesman for the facility says.

And the police chief said he has received no information from Corrections Corp. of America regarding the Oct. 11 riot at the North Fork Correctional Facility that resulted in 16 inmates being hospitalized...

LAWTON, Okla. – A huge fight at Lawton's GEO Prison has left a number of people injured.  It happened around 4:30 p.m., at least 15 people are injured, six of which have been taken to the hospital. The prison is on lockdown.

A 7News crew has seen three ambulances leave the prison.  There is a fourth still parked outside.  We are not sure how many people were involved in the fight or where it took place.  But police suspect the fight was gang-related...

The Geo group is in the process of negotiating contracts that would house thousands of inmates out of California prisons in Lawton's Geo Prison.

Comanche County officials say the Geo group is now in the process of negotiating those contracts. The details of the contract are not laid out just yet, as they are actively negotiating, but what is known is that the facility will be built across the street from the current facility and it will house about 2,500 California inmates.

"Geo is in serious negotiations and continuing negotiations with the state…to house their prisoners," said Comanche County Commissioner Ron Kirby.

That means, Geo needs more room, and to get it, it will build on this land. There has been talk before about it, but this time the deal is supposed to happen…

Two inmates are recovering after a weekend attack at a private prison in Lawton.

Lawton police say the two inmates were attacked Saturday by two other inmates wielding homemade hatchets and knives at the Lawton Correctional Center. Both were transported by ambulance to a Lawton hospital, where one of the victims required surgery.

The prison is owned by Florida-based GEO Group, Inc., and a GEO spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment…

Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America is creating 217 new jobs in Oklahoma, after finalizing a contract with California to house an additional 1,400 inmates at a facility in Sayre, Okla.

Under the same contract, CCA also will house additional California inmates at a facility in Arizona. The contract increases CCA's system-wide number of California inmates to 10,468, up from 7,900.

When hiring is complete, Sayre's North Fork Correctional Facility will employ 529 people…

The Department of Corrections next month will cut its contracts with private prisons by 5 percent, the Board of Corrections was told Wednesday.

Greg Sawyer, DOC chief of departmental services, said the cuts are in response to declining state revenues. State agencies on Tuesday were told to cut budgets by 5 percent. It marked the third consecutive month of cuts.

Sawyer said the cut will be passed down to private prisons and halfway houses and involves about $3.7 million…

I recently toured the private prison in Lawton at the request of state Rep. Randy Terrill, chairman of the Appropriation and Budget Public Safety and Judiciary Committee. As a committee member, it was my duty to review the prison to get a feel for how a private prison might serve as a better option to rebuilding the state's crumbling facilities.

I have several concerns with private prisons. First, they are in the business of profiting from other people's misery and their motive is not to find alternatives to incarceration but to lock up more people. But the fundamental problem I have with privatization is based in the law…

The Oklahoma Department of Corrections is seeking an exit clause in a proposed contract to house inmates at private prisons.

The state is ending a five-year contract with the private Corrections Corporation of America and hopes to have a new deal in place by July 1.

Under the new proposal, the Corrections Department is requesting clauses allowing it to end the contract for any reason or to buy a private prison…

Taking a tougher approach, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections has withheld more than $589,000 in payments to private prison operators in the past year because of staffing shortages.

Cimarron Correctional Facility in Cushing has had five payments of $40,000 or more withheld since December for failing to fill vacancies within 45 days, including several positions in the medical field. In April, the state withheld $59,191 in payments because 19 positions remained unfilled within 45 days. Among them was a clinical supervisor slot that DOC officials said had been open for 457 days.

The Davis Correctional Facility in Holdenville also has had about $76,000 in payments withheld since August because of staffing incidents. Both facilities are owned by Corrections Corporation of America, based in Nashville…

Four Washington prison inmates who were shipped out of state because of overcrowding are under investigation for allegedly assaulting prison workers in Oklahoma on Thursday.

The attacks took place at the North Fork Correctional Facility in Oklahoma, a private prison run by the Corrections Corporation of America. Washington has 304 of its inmates serving time in that prison, part of the 1,160 total number of inmates who are now out of state, said Washington prison official Gary Bohon.

A prison officer and sergeant were injured, treated at a hospital and released, said a CCA spokeswoman. The four offenders were placed in segregation…

It has been months since Roger Peck has seen his son. A year ago, Peck and his wife, Millicent, twice a month were driving more than 400 miles from Grand Junction to see their son, 47-year-old Stephen Dallas Peck, at the Crowley County Correctional Facility in Olney Springs. But when Peck and 479 other inmates were relocated in December and January to the privately owned North Fork Correctional Facility in Sayre, Okla., those visits ended…

Just days before two inmates escaped from a private prison and went on a cross-state crime spree, state officials warned the private facility that its perimeter security was inadequate, records show. One of the escaped convicts, convicted murderer Charles McDaniels, told investigators the guard tower at the facility was usually unmanned and that the razor wire surrounding the perimeter fence was insufficient, according to a report by the state Department of Corrections' Office of Internal Affairs, The Oklahoman reported Tuesday…