What kind of local government body gives a private company "absolute discretion"?

Continuing my response to Barbara Stratton's post: if public-private partnerships are the aspect of private prisons that you oppose, by all means oppose them for that. Did you catch this part in VLCIA's recent response?

CCA has absolute discretion in issuing or withholding the NTP.

What kind of local government body gives a private company "absolute discretion" on whether to proceed with a project? What happened to those appointed officials' own discretion as to the appropriateness of a project for the community? What if their due diligence turns up something unacceptable? For example, that CCA told Decatur County that both Lowndes and Decatur are getting a private prison (one state and one federal), so the guff CCA told VLCIA about Lowndes being the primary site was disingenuous at best. How about if CCA has already breached the contract by not supplying a required document? How about if VLCIA receives convincing arguments from the community that a private prison is a bad business deal?

Indeed, disaster capitalism or the shock doctrine is nothing like the capitalism Adam Smith recommended. The main point of the petition against CCA's private prison in Lowndes County is that it's a bad business deal: it wouldn't save money; it wouldn't increase employment; and it would be likely to close, leaving us all owing money.

Did the Valdosta City and Lowndes County elected governments appoint these people to abdicate their authority to a private company? Maybe they did, since those elected officials are in cahoots on this deal. CCA lauded them all for their support after VLCIA signed the contract with that "absolute discretion" language in it. Does that seem right to you?

Florida has just demonstrated that people of all parties can join together successfully to oppose prison privatization. Let's do that right here in Lowndes County and stop the private prison!

-jsq

Comments

[Barbara Stratton]

I'm confused. My experience in government contracting is the government issues the NTP to the entity responsible for the construction, so what NTP is CCA going to issue to the government? Perhaps this is just normal confusion resulting from mixing government and private business. As a contract administrator I would love to see that contract. Have you managed to get a copy since that should be public record also? But then, if its a public/private partnership they will probably claim the private company can withhold info for proprietary reasons. Yet another reason to outlaw public/private partnerships.

In response to your comment you were going to get me showing up with a camera, I heard there has been some recent celebrating that you & Gretchen have been showing up without one. Not sure why cameras are a problem, but I'm pretty sure they won't appreciate you recruiting more. You two are a great team. Keep up the good work. There are many who appreciate your efforts.

[Lowndes Area Knowledge Exchange]

It does seem backwards, doesn't it?
But that's what the contract says:
http://www.l-a-k-e.org/topics/incarceration/cca/Purchase-Develop%20Agmt%20(CCA).pdf
The confidentiality agreement says VLCIA can't reveal all sorts of things which it has already revealed:
http://lake.typepad.com/on-the-lake-front/2012/02/cca-and-the-problem-with-industrial-authority-confidentiality-agreements.html
More documents from VLCIA about Project Excel here:
http://www.l-a-k-e.org/topics/incarceration/cca/

Sounds like somebody is confused about cameras. We've been on a never-ending road trip (back today), so a few of the usual groups have not seen us lately. However, George is still everywhere with his camera, and other people are also starting to use cameras. You could, too....
-jsq