Governor Jon S. Corzine

Assemblyman Louis D. Greenwald
Assemblyman Gary S. Schaer 
Assemblyman John J. Burzichelli
Assemblyman Joseph Cryan
Assemblyman Gordon M. Johnson
Assembywoman Marcia A. Karrow
Assemblyman Joseph R. Malone III
Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose
Assemblyman Declan J. O'Scanlon Jr.
Assemblywoman Nellie Pou
Assemblywoman Joan M. Quigley
Assemblyman Joseph Vas 

Senator Barbara Buono
Senator Paul A. Sarlo
Senator Anthony R. Bucco
Senator Sandra B. Cunningham
Senator Philip E. Haines
Senator Leonard Lance
Senator Kevin J. O'Toole
Senator Steven V. Oroho
Senator Dana L. Redd
Senator M. Teresa Ruiz
Senator Brian P. Stack
Senator Stephen M. Sweeney
Senator Shirley K. Turner
Senator Joseph F. Vitale

Message:
I am a sworn state law enforcement officer and a member of the New Jersey Law Enforcement Supervisors Association (NJLESA). The NJLESA serves as the exclusive certified collective bargaining unit representing supervisory law enforcement personnel at the rank of sergeant throughout the State of New Jersey. Please allow this letter to serve as notice of my strong opposition to the expansion of private prisons in New Jersey. These privately-operated facilities promise huge cost savings to the state, but only deliver failed results with many hidden costs. Regardless if it is the State Parole Board?s (NJSPB) proposed Residential Assessment Centers (RACs), an expansion of the existing halfway back program through more halfway houses, or the plans by the Department of Corrections to contract the relocation of the State?s Sexually Violent Predators Unit, it is clearly the privatization of these programs and services that will needlessly jeopardize public safety at a questionable savings to taxpayers. First, I am concerned that the much lower recidivism rates advertised for parolees who participated in their various privately-operated halfway-back programs, do not include the number of technical parole violators who enjoyed an uncounted number chances instead of being sent directly back to prison. In addition, I am extremely concerned that cases like Rasheena McCray of Newark, who was killed on March 1, 2008 after being intentionally hit by a car driven by halfway-house escapee Wilquan Williams, will substantially increase. Williams was transferred to the halfway house to complete his state sentence for aggravated assault and various other weapons charges. If he had remained in prison to finish his original sentence, or at least been prevented from escaping from a failed halfway house program, Rasheena McCray would still be alive. As far as the failures of these privately-operated facilities, there can be no dispute that the thousands of escapes that are conveniently masked by the term walkaways, is a poor track record that will only increase the danger to society if we allow them to run new, secure facilities that house dangerous sexually violent predators. Meanwhile, escapes of inmates from state prisons are extremely rare given the fact that they are staffed by trained correction officers with secure perimeters patrolled by armed law enforcement professionals. Another point to consider before expanding the number of beds in the current Halfway Back Program through new Residential Assessment Centers is that the current bed-space is not being used for its original intent. They are using these programs as a halfway-back-to-society program instead of their original intent as a halfway-back-to-prison program, or an alternative sanction in lieu of incarceration. Understanding the price for the incarceration of dangerous, convicted criminals continues to increase along with every other good or service over time, rest assured there will be a much higher political price paid by elected policy-makers and their political parties when New Jersey residents not only continue to bear the burden of high taxes due to ramped over-spending, but are then surrounded by dangerous and violent escapees from failed privately-operated facilities. If real and substantial cost saving without an increased threat to public safety is the true goal, than the economy of scale must be achieved through increased capital investments in larger, well-maintained and efficient prisons. Another clear path to substantial savings for New Jersey taxpayers would be the consolidation of government services through the merger of the Division of Parole back into the Department of Corrections. We must end the duplication of services that needlessly inflates our annual budget with a bulging and ever-increasing bureaucracy. One shocking fact that will soon be exposed to every tax-paying resident of New Jersey is that the proprietors of these failed, privately-operated halfway houses are major contributors to both political parties each election year. Their corporate officers have reportedly donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to numerous state legislators in both political parties. Pay-to-play in New Jersey is now costing law-abiding, tax-paying citizens their lives, and it will only get worse if we allow these privateers to prosper. In closing, the safety of every law-abiding resident of New Jersey and the protection of our children hang in the balance of your decisions on these matters. We must not attempt to balance a bloated state budget, amassed through years of out-of-control spending, at the cost of public safety. We must stop the expansion of privately-run halfway houses in New Jersey, and stop the thousands of escapes from these failed facilities that have become all too common. I implore you to tell these prison privateers that New Jersey?s public safety is not for sale and that although we believe in rehabilitation and redemption, there are penalties for violating our laws that will not be ignored.

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