Transaction Search Form: please type in any of the fields below.
Date: April 29, 2024 Mon
Time: 9:00 pm
Time: 9:00 pm
Results for prison industries
6 results foundAuthor: Jackson, Anita Sarah Title: Toxic Sweatshops: How UNICOR Prison Recycling Harms Workers, Communities, the Environment, and the Recycling Industry Summary: This report examines the e-waste recycling program run by Federal Prison Industries (FPI), a government owned corporation that does business under the trade name UNICOR. Key findings include: UNICOR has failed to adequately protect prisoners and staff from exposure to toxics; UNICOR has failed to protect communities from hazardous materials; and UNICOR undercuts responsible recycling businesses. Details: Oakland, CA: Prison Activist Resource Center, 2006. 56p. Source: Year: 2006 Country: United States URL: Shelf Number: 116206 Keywords: Prison IndustriesPrison LaborPrisoners |
Author: U.S. Department of Justice. Office of the Inspector General. Oversight and Review Division Title: A Review of Federal Prison Industries' Electronic-Waste Recycling Program Summary: This report describes the results of an investigation by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) into the health, safety, and environmental compliance practices of Federal Prison Industries’ (FPI) electronic waste (ewaste) recycling program. Federal Prison Industries, which is known by its trade name “UNICOR,” is a government corporation within the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) that provides employment to staff and inmates at federal prisons throughout the United States. UNICOR sells a variety of consumer products and services, such as office furniture and clothing, and industrial products, such as security fencing and vehicle tags. As of June 2010, UNICOR had 103 factories at 73 prison locations, employing approximately 17,000 inmates or 11 percent of the inmate population. Starting in 1997, UNICOR began to accept computers, monitors, printers, and other types of e-waste for recycling at federal prisons. UNICOR sold these e-waste items to its customers, sometimes following refurbishment, or disassembled the items into their component parts and sold the parts to recyclers for further processing. E-waste contains many toxic substances that can be harmful to humans and to the environment. For example, a computer can contain toxic metals, such as cadmium, lead, mercury, arsenic, and beryllium. Cathode ray tubes, which are found in televisions and computer monitors, typically contain between 2 to 5 pounds of lead. When e-waste is disassembled and recycled, workers can be exposed to toxic metals which can cause serious health implications. UNICOR’s recycling of e-waste resulted in complaints from BOP and UNICOR staff and inmates, most notably from Leroy A. Smith, Jr., a former Safety Manager at the United States Penitentiary (USP) in Atwater, California. In particular, the complaints asserted that UNICOR’s e-waste recycling practices were not safe and had made UNICOR staff and inmates sick. As a result of these complaints and at the request of the BOP, Department of Justice (DOJ), and attorneys for Mr. Smith, the OIG investigated the safety of UNICOR’s e-waste recycling operations, as well as other allegations of theft, conflict of interest, and environmental crimes that arose during our investigation related to UNICOR’s e-waste operations. Details: Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General, 2010. 173p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 2, 2010 at: http://www.justice.gov/oig/reports/BOP/o1010.pdf Year: 2010 Country: United States URL: http://www.justice.gov/oig/reports/BOP/o1010.pdf Shelf Number: 120160 Keywords: Hazardous WasteOffenses Against the EnvironmentPrison IndustriesPrison LaborU.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons |
Author: Minnesota. Office of the Legislative Auditor Title: Evaluation Report: MINNCOR Industries Summary: In 1994, the Minnesota Department of Corrections consolidated and centralized individual prison industry programs into a single statewide business known as MINNCOR Industries. In response to legislative concerns about its operations, the commission directed OLA to evaluate MINNCOR’s overall management and business practices. We found that MINNCOR has generally done a good job in achieving high levels of inmate employment and generating enough revenue to cover its costs. Some of its practices though, especially regarding its labor arrangements with private businesses, lack transparency and have placed the state at risk. Financial reporting and oversight need to be improved, and we make several recommendations to accomplish this. Details: St. Paul, MN: Office of the Legislative Auditor, 2009. 93p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed December 7, 2010 at: http://www.auditor.leg.state.mn.us/ped/pedrep/minncor.pdf Year: 2009 Country: United States URL: http://www.auditor.leg.state.mn.us/ped/pedrep/minncor.pdf Shelf Number: 120402 Keywords: InmatesPrison IndustriesPrison Labor (Minnesota) |
Author: Howard League for Penal Reform Title: Business Behind Bars: Making Real Work in Prison Work Summary: Market research company ICM has polled 1,000 respondents on the U.K. government’s proposals to introduce real work into prisons. 51 per cent of the public support the government’s plans to make it easier to bring private companies into jails to employ prisoners in regular nine-to-five jobs. While only a quarter opposed it, 19% neither supporting nor opposing the policy and 4% recorded as ‘don’t knows’. But digging further down into public opinion reveals that: · 87% agree that if such a proposal were adopted, prisoners employed by private companies should pay tax and national insurance on their earnings; · 82% agree that prisoners employed by private companies should contribute a proportion of their wages to a fund for victims; · 74% agree that prisoners employed by private companies should contribute a proportion of their wages to their families on the outside; · 79% agree that prisoners employed by private companies should put aside a proportion of their wages to save towards their return to the community; · 74% agree that prisoners employed by private companies should be paid the national minimum wage to avoid the prison workforce undercutting the local labour workforce. The Howard League has given the report, Business Behind Bars: Making real work in prison work, to senior officials in government who are keen to implement some of the ideas. The coalition government is committed to cutting the prison population through fewer shorter sentences and improving the rehabilitation of offenders through better training. The report explains that if implemented properly, real work in prison could result in up to 11 prisons hosting work and over 12,000 prisoners working and being given the chance to contribute to society. Details: London: Howard League, 2011. 48p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 6, 2011 at: http://www.howardleague.org/fileadmin/howard_league/user/online_publications/Business_behind_bars.pdf Year: 2011 Country: United Kingdom URL: http://www.howardleague.org/fileadmin/howard_league/user/online_publications/Business_behind_bars.pdf Shelf Number: 121974 Keywords: Correctional ProgramsJob Training, InmatesPrison IndustriesPrison Labor (U.K.)Prisoner Rehabilitation |
Author: Colorado Office of the State Auditor Title: Department of Corrections: Colorado Correctional Industries: Performance Audit Summary: BACKGROUND - CCI's statutory purpose is to provide offenders with employment and training, and operate on a financially profitable basis to reimburse the General Fund. - CCI employs about 1,600 inmates and operates 37 industries shops at state correctional facilities. - During Fiscal Year 2014 CCI had earned revenues of $47 million from its industries shops and about $17.4 million from its canteen. - State agencies are required to purchase certain goods and services from CCI, such as furniture, license plates, and road signs. - CCI is authorized to sell goods and services to the general public and enter into partnerships with private entities, but must follow statutes intended to prevent unfair competition with private businesses. KEY FACTS AND FINDINGS - Although statute requires CCI to operate in a profit-oriented manner, CCI's industries operations earned profit margins on average of less than 1 percent from Fiscal Years 2009 through 2014 and do not reimburse the General Fund for the cost of inmates' incarceration. In addition, CCI lacks long-term profit goals and adequate processes to achieve and improve profitability. - The Department and CCI need to improve controls to ensure that CCI is only funded through its business revenue as required by statute. For Fiscal Years 2009 through 2014 CCI received funding totaling about $12 million from the Department through training agreements without clear evidence that CCI was providing a service to the Department. As a result, it is unclear that this funding is legitimate business revenue for CCI. - CCI did not report some information required by statute and its own policies to stakeholders. For example, written business proposals provided to the Correctional Industries Advisory Committee did not address the businesses' potential impact on the private sector and annual reports and budget requests lacked required information, such as projections on the number of inmates employed and production and sales estimates. - During Fiscal Year 2014 the Department sold about $283,000 in goods and services to the general public through inmate vocational training programs without statutory authority. - Contrary to statute and Department regulations, CCI's charges to inmates and their families for phone service were about $1.5 million higher than necessary to cover the costs for providing the service during Fiscal Year 2014. - Since Fiscal Year 1982, CCI has not provided the Department with laundry, food, facilities maintenance, and vehicle maintenance services as required by statute. Details: Denver: Office of the State Auditor, 2015. 126p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed February 7, 2015 at: http://www.leg.state.co.us/OSA/coauditor1.nsf/All/908C1FE0217F7E0487257DCE00701378/$FILE/1350P%20Colorado%20Correctional%20Industries,%20Department%20of%20Corrections,%20January%202015.pdf Year: 2015 Country: United States URL: http://www.leg.state.co.us/OSA/coauditor1.nsf/All/908C1FE0217F7E0487257DCE00701378/$FILE/1350P%20Colorado%20Correctional%20Industries,%20Department%20of%20Corrections,%20January%202015.pdf Shelf Number: 134555 Keywords: Inmate Labor (Colorado)Prison IndustriesRehabilitation |
Author: Cao, Lan Title: Made in America: Race, Trade, and Prison Labor Summary: Justified on redemptive and rehabilitative grounds, prison industries in the United States, built on the backs of prisoners, are thriving. Prisoners laboring, often for little or no pay, to produce goods and services for the government or for private entities, is not a new phenomenon. But the United States has been incarcerating at a globally unprecedented rate, estimated at five times higher than most countries in the world. The enormous scale of incarceration in the United States is made even more troubling by the overrepresentation of persons of color in the prison system. It is hardly surprising that as federal and state prison industries have grown, so have prison industries that rely on prison labor for private sector profit, and that such labor is primarily performed by minorities, particularly African Americans. Critics have rightly warned about the moral hazards incurred when profit and punishment go hand in hand with publicly run prisons providing cheap labor for private companies. But the moral failures of the prison system, intertwined with the disturbing history of race, are conveniently masked in the euphemism of rehabilitation and redemption. In a new, Orwellian twist, the prison industry has also managed to hitch itself to the populist, anti-international trade wave that has reinvigorated economic nationalism. Add "Buy American" and "Made in the USA" to the purported benefits of prison labor for yet another layer of rhetorical flourish. Thus, in addition to rehabilitating prisoners and preparing them for life after prison, hiring American workers and bringing jobs back to the United States are now providing further justifications for the exploitation of prison labor and the proliferation of prison industries. "Insourcing" which relies on inmate labor can be an even cheaper alternative to outsourcing which relies on Third World labor. Companies seeking to preserve savings from low-cost overseas labor can turn to prison labor because employing prisoners does not require compliance with minimum wage or other safety and environmental regulations. Recasting prison industries as the patriotic return of American manufacturing jobs from overseas may be one of the most troubling euphemisms deployed by proponents of prison labor. The substitution of low-wage foreign workers laboring in unsafe working conditions for U.S. prisoners working for low or no pay is a cynical channeling of the rising awareness of the plight of domestic American workers in the age of globalization. Prisoners make cheese for Whole Foods, underwear for Victoria Secret as well as service call centers for financial institutions. Prison-made products and services are increasingly sold not only to state agencies, but also on the open market in the United States and even exported abroad. Even as the United States berates China about its use of forced prison labor or its exports of products made by convicts, the United States, with its own burgeoning inmate pool, has ironically engaged in similar practices. While U.S. laws ban imports of prison labor goods, there is no parallel statutory provision prohibiting U.S. exports of such goods. Moreover, the historical intersection of race and incarceration in the United States, with the post-Civil War development of convict leasing and chain gangs as modes of prison labor, raises the troubling prospect of pervasive racial bias. This systemic bias, combined with the requirement that all prisoners must work, render U.S. prison labor programs morally suspect in ways not so remote from China's use of political dissidents in reeducation camps. The first part of this Article provides a general overview of the prison labor industrial complex and examines the relationship between big business and prison labor in both state and federal systems. It also focuses on the volatile and controversial outsourcing dynamics in the ongoing trade debate. Next, the Article explores the structural complexity intrinsic in prison labor because it embodies both economic and rehabilitative objectives and thus does not fit neatly into the conventional categories of market or non-market work, creating conceptual difficulties in both analysis and proposed solutions. As a result, prison workers are not deemed employees and thus not eligible for the minimum wage afforded other workers. This Article also provides the necessary historical background, particularly the racial dimensions at the root of state and private exploitation of prison labor, arguing that race and incarceration in the United States cannot be separated. The legal and economic ambiguity of prison labor allows the exploitation of racial disparities in the prison system to continue. The last part of the Article examines the wildly inconsistent case law that addresses the application of the Federal Labor Standards Act ("FLSA") and argues that the profit-making, economic character of prison work makes it a market activity that entitles prison workers to the minimum wage mandate of the FLSA. The proposal here is intended as a modest first step towards prison labor reform. It is grounded in pragmatism and incrementalism and is not meant to address all the intricacies intrinsic in this historical tragedy and deeply entrenched system of racial and social control. Rather, it is a plausible proposal that, if implemented, would be an important first step towards reform. Legally recognizing prison workers' right to minimum wage will accomplish a significant immediate change, and will bring prison labor into heightened scrutiny enabling a national conversation about broader reform. Details: Orange, CA: Chapman University, The Dale E. Fowler School of Law, 2018. 59p. Source: Internet Resource: accessed May 30, 2018 at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3136654 Year: 2018 Country: United States URL: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3136654 Shelf Number: 150387 Keywords: Inmate LaborPrison IndustriesPrison Labor |