LETTERS: Thursday

Partnership prisons help state

I, along with co-workers and respected researchers in corrections, read with dismay the flawed arguments in The Gazette’s Sept. 21 Our View, “Profit prisons die in recession.” The Gazette has surprisingly taken a very ill-informed stance on the important topic of corrections partnerships.

We are in full partnership with Colorado government. We operate prisons on behalf of the state, and these prisons function exactly as a government-run prison. We humanely house inmates in a secure setting. We offer addictions treatment, education, vocational training and faith-based courses, so inmates can get on the right path. Studies show that rehabilitation lessens the likelihood of inmates returning to crime when they are released.

Partnership prisons provide the best of both worlds — the oversight and accountability from government with the cost effectiveness and innovation of business. The standards for operating any prison are high. For those of us who work for partnership prisons, we expect to be held to an even higher standard. And we deliver on this, every day. Plus, we are making the tax dollars of hard-working Coloradans stretch further. We all agree that, especially in these economic times, taxpayers deserve the most efficient government possible.

Our partnership prisons also relieve the overcrowded — and, thus, unsafe — conditions in government-run prisons. Overcrowding leads to agitated inmates, overworked staff and fewer opportunities for inmate rehabilitation. By having Colorado partner with business to build and operate prisons to relieve overcrowding, the entire state correctional system is safer, which means all communities are safer.

So, government isn’t “subsidizing” partnership prisons, as the editorial claims. This is not an “us” versus “them” issue. We are in partnership together — government and business. Government pays us, just like it pays its own wardens and correctional employees. But partnership prisons are highly efficient and innovative, while also being secure and accountable.

As for correctional providers wanting more crime and more criminals, that is nonsense. We live in communities, just like you. We want our families safe from crime, like everyone else. We aren’t here to make or give opinions about public policy, such as early release of inmates. But we do know that our partnership prisons, with our nearly 1,000 dedicated Colorado employees, provide meaningful rehabilitation and are an important part of the Colorado correctional system.

Louise Grant

Vice president

Marketing and communications

Corrections Corporation of America

Nashville, Tenn.

Solve budget woes with fee

The proposal to increase property taxes to cover the city’s income shortfall is unfair. Why should one segment of the population carry the burden for everyone else? Furthermore, the usual cry that fire and police cutbacks will occur, and parks closed, is the typical emotional and financial blackmail we continually hear when the city has failed to properly manage its budget. They fail, we pay. No, not this time and it might mean a taxpayers’ revolt.

Solution? Thousands of men and women who live outside the city, and thus pay no property taxes to the city, are employed in the city. Every day they enjoy the use of our streets, traffic lights, parks and ball fields, snow-plowed streets in winter, fire and police protection, plus all the hidden goods and services to keep the city running. And they pay nothing for this. All of those thousands of people should be paying a fee to work in our city. How about an income tax on everyone who works in the city? Or a “head tax”, a fee of $25 a month or whatever, that everyone who lives outside the city but works in the city, pays to share the economic costs of all the goods and services they receive and use here? The income would be millions for city operations. No more free rides. Tax everyone who uses and benefits from our city.

James Ciletti

Colorado Springs

Political anger rising in U.S.

I am an Anglo, age 47 years, and male. I used to give my money to the Republican Party. I helped put Bill Clinton in office his first term, an instance of stupidity I hope never to repeat.

I still will not vote for any more Democrats, but the Republicans will no longer get my money. They let me down. Over and over again, they let me down. Is there any man or woman out there who can look at the good of the country over the good of their own personal lives? I believe those people exist everywhere. Everywhere, that is, except your United States government. Any government in any country, for that matter.

So what are we going to do?

I despise Nancy Pelosi’s view of America. She did, however, have the foresight to note that the people are so angry right now, on both sides of the aisle, that we might do something stupid. Can you imagine what the response is going to be from the left if she is correct, and some idiot shoots and maims, or kills, a government official? Many Republicans will join the left in defeating the gun lobby if that happens. If you really listen to what she said though, she never once directed any part of her comment to either side of the fence. Again, she was right, because the truth of the matter is that there are now many passionate gun-toting liberals as well as conservatives.

I ask those of you who still care if we remain the land of the free to remember that we created this country on the heels of a revolution where we demanded that the government not control us, and try to wrap your head around whether or not you are prepared to save and protect what our ancestors created for us?

Ken Duncan

Colorado Springs

Fix only what’s broken

It looks to me as if the administration really wants to be in the business of taking over and running our health care. The Congress could very easily fix some of the problems with our health care without dismantling and rebuilding it into a monolith of a system. If I were to take my car in to a mechanic to see what was wrong with it and he discovered that I should have a new starter, would I tell him not to just put in a new starter but overhaul the whole car? That is exactly what the Congress and this administration is doing to our health care — overlook the obvious and overhaul the whole thing. It is senseless; spending money that we don’t have and nationalizing a program that most folks are happy with all for more control and power over our lives.

If part of the money to pay for this overhaul will come from Medicare and Medicaid fraud and waste, then what does that say about the ability of the government to run an additional part of our health care? Let’s not throw out the baby with the bath water. Fix only what needs to be fixed and leave the rest of us alone.

Joann Armstrong

Colorado Springs