PRISONERS
OF PROFIT
Florida Gov. Rick Scott sent
a frosty response to Washington, arguing that the issues were
“confined to the closed facility”
and “do not constitute a sufficient, sound or fair basis for concluding that an entire state agency and its employees are failing to
properly administer the juvenile
justice system in Florida.”
In response to questions about
whether the state has hired out-
HUFFINGTON
11.03.13
Thompson Academy, the facility
where Jerry Blanton had blown
the whistle and lost his job eight
years earlier. In a letter to YSI
sent in summer 2012, the state
told the company that the contract would end because the DJJ
was “moving away from large
institutional models” and toward smaller, community-based
programs. Still, the letter added,
“We strongly encourage your
“They don’t want any outside company, because
they want the program to look like it’s running
smoothly. Outside support should be called for a
lot of what goes on, but they don’t do that.”
side consultants to review its
juvenile commitment system, as
recommended by the Justice Department, a spokeswoman pointed
only to Scott’s letter.
In the push to fully privatize the
system and phase out state-run
facilities, Florida has continued
both to renew YSI’s contracts and
to award the company new ones.
Last year, Florida opted not to
extend YSI’s contract to oversee
participation” in an upcoming
bid for new contracts.
In January, the state gave YSI
a $7.3 million, five-year contract
to run the new Broward Youth
Treatment Center, a 28-bed program less than a mile away from
Thompson. And this summer, YSI
won contracts to take over two
more state facilities, one in the
Tampa area and another in
Jacksonville.
Chris Kirkham is a business reporter
at The Huffington Post.