"LABOR ISSUES"

03/10/2009

In late February, State Rep. Jim McReynolds (D-Lufkin) and State Sen. Robert Nichols (R-Jacksonville) , introduced companion bills to drastically alter state prison labor programs. According to the legislators, both bills, (SB 1169 and HB 1914) would stop job loss and unfair competition by:

eliminating sweetheart deals and requiring businesses using prison labor to pay a fair market value for use of facilities;
moving oversight of the program from the Prison Industry Oversight Authority to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) board;
preventing TDCJ from approving contracts resulting in job loss anywhere in Texas;
allowing employers to submit a sworn statement that their business would be hurt and jobs could be lost by approval of a specific prison industry contract;
requiring job and product descriptions be specific so employers can recognize a prison industry contract that would unfairly threaten their business;
creating notification for area businesses and posting information about programs online; and notifying the state senator and state representative in whose districts the project would be located.

The measure would certainly increase transparency and accountability for such contracts. It is a significant measure from the chair of the House Corrections Committee.

In related materials, the legislators cite a specific example of the company Direct Trailer, which paid only $1 a year to lease 70,000 sqare feet of factory from a local state prison and advertised they could sell their products for less because of prison labor.

A competitor of Direct Trailer is Lufkin Industries Inc. which claims that it could not fairly compete and sell products for similar prices. As a result, Lufkin Industies recently closed its trailer manufacturing division and layed off 150 employees.

We will be tracking the developments of these bills as they navigate their way through the legislature. Stay tuned...

Legislation would keep Private Prison Labor from competing with Free World Labor

Folks are sent to TDCJ now WITHOUT the means to Earn work time credits but if they refuse to work-- they are written cases that TAKE their Good Time credits thereby hurting their ability to make parole.

This is definitely a violation of Liberty Interests that is guaranteed by the Constitution.

I have anticipated for several years now that this in ability to earn Work Time credits would HURT TDCJ's means of staffing the units with labor.

I am starting to send out questionnaires to our Good Writ Writer people about the concept of taking the issue to court.

Will keep you/JBS posted.

En la Lucha por los Pueblos del Carcel.
D R

July 6, 2008

Critics: Prison labor hurts free-world jobs
Program allows companies to employ inmates, operate for less with subsidies

By LISA SANDBERG

AUSTIN — The East Texas town of Lufkin was home to one of the biggest manufacturers of tractor-trailer beds in the state until sluggish sales forced the firm, Lufkin Industries, to close its factory earlier this year, displacing 150 workers.

For everyone but the affected employees, the story might have ended as little more than a cautionary tale of what happens when an established business gets squeezed by a smaller, nearby competitor, in this case, Direct Trailer and Equipment Co., which sells an almost an identical product for as much as $2,000 less.

Instead, plenty of people have taken notice of this East Texas labor imbroglio, and some are crying foul.

As it turns out, Direct Trailer produces its tractor beds with cheap prison labor and subsidies from the state of Texas. The company rents space inside the Michael Unit, a 2,900-bed facility in Tennessee Colony, for $1 a year. The state foots the tab on work force health care, too.

The arrangement is part of a federal program that allows select companies to provide paid work experience to select prisoners, as long as the prison operation doesn't eliminate similar free-world jobs nearby. The Prison Industry Enhancement, or PIE, initiative has been operating in Texas since 1993 and includes nearly 400 inmates working in five prison plants across the state.

Companies applying to operate inside the prisons must have outside- prison operations and must pay wages commensurate with those paid for similar work in the same locality's private sector. (Welders make at least $8 an hour in the area where Direct Trailer operates its prison plant.)

Inmates keep about 20 percent of their wages, with the rest going to their dependents, victims, the courts and the state.

Paul Perez, general counsel for Lufkin Industries, said his company paid workers upward of $15 an hour and couldn't compete in an already competitive market against a newcomer who could produce a less expensive product.

"It exacerbated an already difficult situation," Perez said.

Direct Trailer's president, John Nelson, could not be reached for comment.

One state lawmaker, Sen. Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville, is calling not just for Direct Trailer's state contract to be severed, but he's also questioning the validity of every one of PIE's five prison programs.

Nichols accuses PIE's board, known as the Private Sector Prison Industries Oversight Authority, of approving the contract with Direct Trailer without having the necessary employment data required by the federal government and the board.

He said that when he investigated Direct Trailer's 2005 certification, he discovered that the board compared only overall employment in the area against national employment data without looking at local employment data for "specific skills, crafts or trades," as was also required.

Nichols also said that when he contacted the Texas Workforce Commission, he received a letter last month that said the agency "does not have unemployment data for specific skills, crafts, trades or occupations." The letter was signed by a manager Jesse Lewis, director of external relations.

Nichols said that can mean only one thing: "None of (the programs) are meeting the guidelines."

Kathy Flanagan, presiding officer of the oversight board, acknowledged the board made decisions looking at "only part of the information," but she deflected blame elsewhere. "It's not our responsibility to ask the Texas Workforce Commission how they get their information."

She said in light of the current controversy, the board was now reviewing its policy and procedures.

Such comments are unlikely to satisfy labor officials, who complain that even when the rules are followed, the prison program need only demonstrate no harm to local jobs.

"We think the law needs to be clear: Using prison labor should not result in job losses anywhere, and certainly not in the state of Texas," said Rick Levy, legal director of the Texas AFL-CIO.

Nichols said he will urge the oversight board to amend its rules so that contracts are signed only with companies that can show no jobs anywhere in the state will be affected by a prison operation.

"If you can train a prisoner (in) a trade, I think that's very good. But not if one law-abiding Texan has to lose his job," Nichols said.

Robert Carter, PIE's program administrator, is hoping that the fracas won't lead to the demise of a program that's provided job training and pay to hundreds of inmates, the vast majority of who will one day be released.

He said studies indicate that those who participate in PIE get jobs quicker upon release, earn higher pay and stay in them longer than non-participants.

Perez said his company has been able to rehire most of the 150 laid- off workers from the trailer plant and put them to work manufacturing oil field equipment.

But there are new rumblings from the owner of another East Texas trailer manufacturing firm. Charles Bright, who owns Bright Coop, said his sales are down, and he's wondering if it's because Direct Trailer is selling its product cheaper.

"I'm not opposed to the program, as long as I can rent one of those buildings for $1 a year," Bright said.

lsandberg@express-news.net
Prison labor hurts
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle Austin Bureau

As Nations Economic Conditions worsen, Capitalists lean more and more on the Prison Industrial Complex to prop up economy.

National and State Governments continue to Legislate Penal Laws directed to effect the poor and people of color. Incarceration Rates Soar to a record high of 1,610 per week.The record high incarceration has resulted in the disenfranchisement of millions of Americans and highlights the stark differences within the class structure of the wealthy and poor.

Comparatively, Texas has the highest rate of incarceration in the world, incarcerating 1,035 of the population for every 100,000. One of three incarcerated are people of color; 63% higher than the national average. Roughly 2,000.000 individuals in Texas are under the preview of the Criminal Justice (Just-Us) System by virtue of employment, incarceration or indirect supervision such as probation or parole.

There Are Currently 2 Million U.S. Citizens Locked Up.

Click Here To Read More On This.

As the Criminal Justice System continues to double and re-double so do the number of Human Rights Abuses.

Texas Prisons have been cited as being one of the most brutal in the nation, yet prison administrators, in trying to preserve their "culture of violence", continue to ignore Federal Court Ordered mandates.

This bespeaks eloquently the need of Texans to organize. P.A.P.A. continues to offer the only viable means of lawful organization directed to establish a socio-political sect, including friends, family and supporters of prisoners.

We must organize to affect Awarness and favorable legislation aimed at both stopping Human Rights abuses and halting the imposition of oppressive penal laws and racial disparity. Please join us and become part of the soultion.

THANK YOU...
"WE FIGHT TO WIN. WE CERTAINLY DO!"
IN SOLIDARITY,
WILLIE A. MILTON, Co-Founder;
DWIGHT RAWLINSON National Secretary