The National Correctional Industries Association - NCIA- is a private non-profit "Association" dedicated to promoting and growing prison industries nationwide. They exist to promote prison industry expansion and growth in a manner similar to the American Legislative Exchange Council's - ALEC- pursuit of expanding and increasing corporate profits and influence within our governments - state and federal.
There is a symbiosis that links ALEC and the NCIA: prison labor, prison industry and increasing incarceration. For ALEC their incarceration efforts are in pursuit of enacting more criminal laws and proposing legislation to increase the numbers of prisoners and thus profits of their member's CCA and Geo Group's bottom line. Additionally more arrests equates to more opportunities of providing bonds while defendants await trial - translated into more profits to their member, American Bail Coalition.
For the NCIA ALEC's model and proposed legislation fits nicely: it increases the number of inmates in prison and thus the number of potential workers for their prison industries.
Joint efforts of these two groups combined, cause an increase in manufacturing behind prison fences. This contributes to the steady loss of private sector jobs and diminishing wages for the jobs still remaining within the private sectors - Insourcing in it's rawest form.
I've written extensively about ALEC, identifying their member corporations, lawmakers and many of the laws they willingly claim responsibility for. I have briefly touched upon the NCIA, exposing their involvement in PIECP and the fact this Association has been given sole authority over operations of this federal program. Today we'll take an in-depth look at those individuals, corporations and prison industries that make up the NCIA.
The NCIA's mission is stated thus:
"NCIA’s Mission Statement
The mission of the National Correctional Industries Association is to promote excellence and credibility in correctional industries through professional development and innovative business solutions that improve public safety and successful offender reentry."
A simple and short mission statement, for sure. Nothing in there about oversight, compliance with existing state or federal laws, PIECP, etc.
Business of the NCIA is directed by 22 Board members. Some of the names I've mentioned in writing about PRIDE of Florida, are among the names of the NCIA Board members: Brian Connett and Carol Tortarelli. Connett has moved on from PRIDE, serving now as the Deputy Director of Nevada's prison industry operations and Torrtarelli has assumed Connett's old position at PRIDE and has worked her way onto the NCIA Board as PRIDE's representative. In addition here are all the members, the company or industry they represent and their positions with the NCIA:
PRESIDENT/CHAIRMAN - Don Guillory, CEO of Virginia Correctional Enterprises,
PRESIDENT – ELECT - Denny Fracassi, Director Rough Rider Industries
VICE PRESIDENT OF PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT - Gayle Lambert, Administrator Montana Correctional Enterprises
VICE PRESIDENT OF MARKETING - Deputy Director, Brian Connett, Nevada DOC- Silver State Industries
TREASURER - Karen Brown, Director North Carolina Correction Enterprises
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND CORPORATE SECRETARY Gina Honeycutt, Executive Director NCIA
AT – LARGE BOARD MEMBERS:
Jerry Campbell, Industry Administrator Arkansas Correctional Industries
J.D. Colbert, Administrator Oklahoma Correctional Industries
Susan Cunningham, Director of Workforce Development TRICOR (Tenn. Prison Ind.)
Paul Laird, Chief Operating Officer Federal Prison Industries
John Miller, CEO Mississippi Prison Industries Corporation
Anthony Miller, Director Pennsylvania Bureau of Correctional Industries
Charles L. Pattillo California Prison Industry Authority
Carol Tortarelli, Director, Mission Programs PRIDE Enterprises
ACA REPRESENTATIVE Mark Saunders VP-Project Manager Nakamoto Group
CORPORATE REPRESENTATIVE Tom Grissom, Consultant MTJ American
JAIL INDUSTRIES REPRESENTATIVE Dean Mason, Executive Director Washington State Jail Industries Board
CENTRAL REGIONAL APPOINTEE - Mike Herron, Director PEN Products (IN.)
NORTHEAST REGIONAL APPOINTEE - Joe Sommerville, Chief Operations Officer Maryland Correctional Enterprises
SOUTHEAST REGIONAL APPOINTEE Andy Farquhar, Director Alabama Correctional Industries
SOUTH CENTRAL REGIONAL APPOINTEE - Steve Edwards, PIECP Manager Arkansas Correctional Industries
WEST REGIONAL APPOINTEE - Martin Thomas,General Manager Idaho Correctional Industries
The foregoing individuals representing the various suppliers, vendor businesses and prison industries named, are those chosen by the federal government - through the NCIA - to oversee their own operations and behavior under PIECP. I've asked everyone from the Deputy Director of OJP down, "Who thunk this up?" Comparatively how about we sentence an offender to prison and have him oversee his own rehabilitation and when he thinks he's ready, release him? Would that work for anyone? No. There must be safeguards and checks in place to avoid even the slightest appearance of impropriety. In the case of the NCIA, impropriety is not slight, it is glaring.
As can be seen every one of the above individuals represent a prison industry operation involved in using inmate labor and PIECP. The American Correctional Association (ACA) and UNICOR (Federal Prison Industries) are represented by Board members. It is thus inconceivable to me that all of these knowledgeable and experienced individuals involved in operating participating state prison industries are not fully aware of the provisions and requirements of the PIE Certification Program.
Enforcement of PIECP requirements such as paying prevailing wages or ensuring that authorized deductions taken from worker wages are used for the purposes authorized by PIECP, should be an easy determination. Ensuring that prison industry operations do not result in the loss of private sector jobs or unfair competition should also be a no brainer. Violations have been committed - and continue to be committed - it is therefore obvious to me that an allowance of such violations have become "Standard Operating Procedures" by the NCIA in pursuit of expansion and influence in both public and private sectors.
The stated mission and goals of the NCIA are in direct conflict with actual operations performed in a manner that disallows true enforcement of 18 USC 1761(c) and the final PIECP Guidelines. I have communicated these facts to the NCIA, PRIDE, the BJA and DOJ over the past 7 years on numerous occasions. In 2008 I issued a scathing "Independent PIECP Report" (click on PRIDE folder then PIECP 2008 Report.doc). Upon receipt the NCIA responded by requesting I remove their email address from my contact list, so I did. Instead of responding to the report and providing any argument of the facts - or documents demonstrating that any of the issues presented in my report was erroneous - they chose to ignore it, hoping others would also.
Make no mistake about this Association and PIECP: this is an important war in saving private sector jobs and preventing diversion of stimulus funds from being directed to the prison industries to create more inmate jobs and products. If you think the prison industries and the NCIA are not attempting to get their hands on stimulus money from the government, read the excerpt from the March 2010 Business meeting minutes:
"Paul Laird, COO of Federal Prison Industries, reported on current Federal legislative activity. He opened by saying that because of the focus on the Healthcare bill, there had not been too much focus on Correctional Industries. He continued that it was their hope that there would be positive CI legislation after the Healthcare Bill debate. He added that there may also be some negative legislation authored by Congressman Hoekstra and that another congressman from MI produced a YouTube video “Green Jobs go to Inmate in Orange Jumpsuits.” Glen Beck also produced a story on this. He also talked briefly about FPI receiving stimulus funds for some projects and that NPR had run a story on this."
Previously they addressed "Green Jobs" being a possibility for new employment - back in August of last year:
Board Member Robert Grieser indicated it had been fairly quiet on the legislative front in terms of having opposition. He mentioned new markets would give more opportunity for new employees. Green jobs are possible avenues for new employment.
Do you think they were referring to "new employment" within the private sector? No, they mean for inmates and the corporations involved in using their labor.
With the push for clean energy involving solar, wind and other important technologies, the prison industries are gearing up to take most production and manufacturing away from the private sector and turn it over to inmates in the various prison industries. The NCIA are working hard to ensure their members get big pieces of "Clean Energy" legislation and product developments. Because these efforts will require financing, the easiest and quickest path to a source of funds is the stimulus money available from the federal government. Members of the NCIA are aware of this and have concerns of how to get around a prohibition that disallows states making a profit off of stimulus funds:
"A Board member inquired if any other Correctional Industry program had been approached for retained earnings (where the Federal government has given funds to the state and the state then used these funds for CI programming). The auditors spearheading this inquiry were going back many years, sometimes to the 1980s, to compute what the CI will owe as retained earnings. One other CI program, also in the northeast, reported that they too had been approached. Another Board member stated that the concept is that the state can’t profit from Federal funds and that the state’s general fund receiving money back from CI is considered profit. Another Board member recommended that each CI director that is experiencing this should get in touch with their Governor’s office. He also recommended that NCIA pursue discussions with the National Governor’s Association if it affected other state CI programs."
In March of this year I wrote an article that was published by Prison Legal News. The article exposed the use of the NCIA to oversee themselves and identified many individual and cumulative violations. This article was immediately noticed by the NCIA Executive Director, Gina Honeycutt and brought to the Board's attention at the March Board meeting. Below is a paragraph from their meeting minutes about the article and the steps they intend to initiate to field questions raised by anyone regarding the PIE Program:
"However, Ms. Honeycutt received an email from BJA in early March stating that BJA would only be able to fund the PIE Program in the amount of $150,000. Ms. Honeycutt went back to BJA to pursue what would be contained in the reduced funding and it was her understanding that the grant would probably be changed to the amount of $200,000. Ms. Honeycutt then distributed an article that was recently published in Prison Legal News by Bob Sloan, an ex-offender who worked in the PRIDE PIE program. Ms. Honeycutt indicated that she was distributing this article because of its anti-PIE and anti-NCIA content. She also reported that Gayle Lambert in Montana had just received an email with very similar language from her governor’s office and felt that it may have been as a result of this article. Ms. Honeycutt asked if NCIA should distribute “talking points” response to any questions/correspondence resulting from the Bob Sloan article. The Board members agreed that a template response would be helpful."
Again attention must be drawn to the repeated refusal of everyone from the BJA through the NCIA to individual prison industry personnel, to respond to my accusations. They haven't accused me of distorting facts, have not responded by denying any of my allegations and, have not challenged the authenticity of the documents I've published. No, they simply go about their business of increasing inmate jobs by helping to eliminate yours through continued violations of PIECP and develop "talking points" issued to their membership in an attempt to deflect further investigation and to continue to mis-inform both public and government inquiries while they continue to take our jobs and increase membership.
I have offered to discuss the issues with all involved, and they won't accept any offer to address important issues in my efforts of stopping the elimination of private sector jobs. As they continue to ignore pleas and allegations from an informed public, they push for increasing NCIA membership and the dues that come from new members. In their quest for new memberships they have begun pushing for more and more youthful offender or juvenile participation in PIECP. In addition they see jail prisoners as an "untapped resource":
"New Board Member Dean Mason spoke for a few minutes on behalf of Jail Industries since JI Representative Mike Mastriani could not attend the Board meeting. Mr. Mason stated that jail industries would be represented on the NIC satellite broadcast and that many JI programs are beginning to collaborate with reentry programs. He added that jail industries being represented at the national level will bring on more membership and that jails are an untapped resource. He also added that Rod Miller had manned a Jail Industries booth at the AJA conference in May, stating that Gwyn Ingley had provided the booth complimentary. He stated that Ms. Honeycutt and Mr. Miller were exchanging more information for a stronger collaboration between them and with AJA. Ms. Honeycutt announced that the Denver Sheriff’s Office had been approved by BJA as the 43rd PIE Certificate holder in July."
Again, lest you have any doubt as to both the intention of the NCIA and conservative Republicans regarding the use of inmate labor, immigrants and high school drop-outs - nationwide - you can read this article found on the Red State website that includes the below quotes:
"The one large untapped labor pool is prison laborers. Most state prisons and local jails have work-release programs. Considering that 51% of the Nation’s 2.1 million incarcerated people are behind bars for non-violent offenses, that represents a potential pool of more than 1 million people. Assuming even half of them are used for these purposes, it would most likely meet most labor demands, although there would be obvious regional discrepancies. Naturally, some prisoners could not be released to small employers using a small number of employees for fear of flight. But they can most certainly be utilized in the agricultural sector with truly low flight risks assigned to other sectors- lawn care, cleaning, construction, food preparation, and the hospitality industry.
"Along these lines, another major source of cheap labor is those low-skilled, high school drop outs. It would be imperative that local officials determine the labor needs and the pool of such potential cheap labor and that they be matched up. Prohibiting them from use of social welfare programs is one carrot/stick that can be used to “nudge” these people in that direction. Again, there may be regional discrepancies, but using this labor pool would cut into the use of illegal immigrants. Additionally, the chronically low-skill, low-education unemployed could be “nudged” into these fields to offset benefits."
As this series has shown, corporate interests have pervaded all corners of our society in search of more and more wealth and power. Along the way they have managed to corrupt government agencies and branches previously believed to have been incorruptible. By their ignoring the issues, numerous violations of labor, wages and interstate transportation of prisoner made goods, the BJA and OJP have demonstrated a laxness bordering on outright deliberate negligence. Their lack of oversight and involvement is contributing to the loss of thousands of our jobs - and continues as this is written. Their actions - or lack of action - is in direct conflict with our demands for more jobs and the President's responsive agenda of creating jobs.
In black and white terms, nothing so clearly demonstrates the division between our government branches as this tug of war between the President's job creation goals and the federal agencies entrusted with implementing the administration's objectives. Instead of creating the jobs needed, the DOJ and OJP through the BJA and NCIA pursue a goal of increasing prison labor jobs through a reduction in private sector employment. The agencies named represent the polar opposite of what is intended.
Legislative intent of creating a level playing field for private sector and prison industry competition has been circumvented through deregulation and outsourcing of the program to corporate interests. The majority of citizens have been totally unaware of PIECP until recently. They had no idea the program existed and was contributing to their job losses over the past several years. This is as intended by those manipulating the media and information available to reduce our knowledge of th subject - and thus render us unable to complain about a program we're in the dark about.
We all have to make others aware of the program and how it is contributing to our lost jobs and income. In this way more pressure can be exerted by the public to reform this program so it no longer represents a cash cow to corporations and ALEC members and lawmakers who profit from it. In taking this step we start on a path that will return jobs to the private sector by exposing the corruption and manipulations to the bright light of reform. By reading and participating in this discussion readers are taking the first step to transform the landscape that represents our jobs.
As this series nears completion, I will continue my efforts of exposing the violative actions of those involved in Insourcing our jobs to prisoners. I will also address ways to reduce incarceration through elimination of the profits made through use of prisoner labor. Please continue to join this informative and important discussion.
Some have asked that I provide links to the other segments in this series. Below you will find them.
INSOURCING - A new concept about private sector job losses
INSOURCING-II-The Wheel of Money and Sorrow...
INSOURCING-III - Corporate Wheel of Profit Rolls On...
INSOURCING-IV - More Profits Through Monopolies...-
INSOURCING - The Real Reason your jobs MUST go to prison and what they do with the money saved...
INSOURCING - Why this Investigative series began...
INSOURCING - Florida Corruption Exposed
INSOURCING- Violations-under-PIECP
INSOURCING - Fighting for reform - can cost you your job.