HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

H.B. NO.

415

TWENTY-FIFTH LEGISLATURE, 2009

H.D. 2

STATE OF HAWAII

S.D. 1

 

 

 

 

 

A BILL FOR AN ACT

 

 

RELATING TO PUBLIC SAFETY.

 

 

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

 


     SECTION 1.  In response to the governor's plan to address the State's budget shortfall by, among other things, closing the Kulani correctional facility, a senate ad hoc committee reviewed and assessed the impact that the imminent reduction in government services would have on Hawaii's communities, inmates, and the State's correctional system.

     Information gathered in briefings held in Hilo and Kailua-Kona on Hawaii Island and at the state capitol, revealed that:

     (1)  The Kulani correctional facility, in operation since 1946, is a minimum security facility situated on eight thousand acres outside Hilo, Hawaii.  The facility houses adult male felons serving the last four years toward their tentative parole date;

     (2)  The facility is the only department of public safety facility that is a mandatory work camp, requiring all inmates to work full time.  Unlike other facilities that have only limited vocational training in mostly unskilled positions, Kulani correctional facility offers a wide range of educational training and occupational skills programs focusing on mechanical repair and maintenance, construction, heavy equipment operation, computer work, and horticulture and conservation.  Inmates use these skills in community service projects, helping Hawaii Island communities with projects that would otherwise be unaffordable;

     (3)  The Kulani correctional facility is the only department of public safety facility with a sex offender treatment program for minimum-custody sex offenders who are neither violent nor mentally challenged and are willing to work.  The sex offender treatment program is one of the most successful in the nation.  Treatment providers attribute this success to the facility's unique provision of treatment in an environment where inmates must also work and function responsibly with minimum supervision.  Options for inmate transfer to other facilities with sex offender treatment are limited and would involve, for example, housing minimum-custody inmates in medium-security facilities, which conflicts with the standards of the American Correctional Association and the department of public safety's policy and procedures;

     (4)  Discontinuing the programs offered by the Kulani correctional facility will significantly impede present and future inmates from completing their prescriptive programs.  Since completion of a prescriptive program is a requirement for parole eligibility, this will force inmates to remain in incarceration longer.  It may also impede their successful reentry into society upon release;

     (5)  While the Kulani correctional facility is a one hundred sixty-bed facility, it has housed up to two hundred twenty inmates without operational problems;

     (6)  Since 2000, the facility has received state capital improvement project funding of $8,136,937; and

     (7)  As a result of the facility's closure, local vendors will lose tens of thousands of dollars of sales in goods and services, causing a detrimental economic ripple effect for businesses throughout the island of Hawaii.

     The legislature finds that the information gathered by the senate ad hoc committee raises questions about the wisdom of closing the Kulani correctional facility.  The State has made a significant capital investment in this facility and its closure would severely impede the department of public safety's ability to meet the needs of present and future inmates, its own policies, and accepted corrections standards and would result in numerous adverse impacts to Hawaii Island communities.

     The Community Safety Act of 2007 requires the department of public safety to develop a comprehensive and effective offender reentry system plan for adult offenders exiting the prison system.  That Act further requires the department to develop comprehensive reentry plans and curricula for individuals exiting correctional facilities to reduce recidivism and increase a person's successful reentry into the community.  Kulani correctional facility played a pivotal role in the reentry system, by preparing qualified inmates for their eventual return to the community by providing job training, treatment programs, and graduated exposure to the community.  Moreover, Kulani correctional facility's programs were coordinated and articulated with those at the Hawaii community correctional center/Hale Nani, the reentry point for Hawaii island inmates, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of reentry on the island of Hawaii.

     The legislature further finds that the closure of this facility with its unique and needed programs, when considered with the fact that six of nine Hawaii correctional facilities are under capacity, raises the question of the cost-effectiveness of the department of public safety's policy of contracting with Corrections Corporation of America to house a substantial number of Hawaii inmates in mainland private prisons at significant cost to the State and to the detriment of Hawaii inmates whose consideration for parole has and will be delayed due to the absence at these facilities of programs needed by the inmates to complete their prescriptive programs.

     The department of public safety's own study, presented to the legislature in 2008, indicated that a significant number of inmates housed in medium security prisons on the mainland and at the medium security federal detention center should have been classified as minimum or community security.  These inmates could have been housed at Kulani correctional facility and other underused facilities in Hawaii.  Instead, the department chose to pay a private vendor and the federal government an additional cost to house Hawaii inmates.

     The purpose of this Act is to require an audit of the department of safety's contracts with Corrections Corporation of America and the federal detention center in Honolulu, which focuses on a comparison, in terms of quality of programming, costs, and economic benefit to the State, of housing Hawaii inmates in mainland facilities and in the federal detention center, with housing Hawaii inmates in Hawaii facilities operated by the State.

     SECTION 2.  The auditor is directed to conduct a financial and management audit of the department of public safety's contracts with Corrections Corporation of America and the federal detention center in Honolulu, which focuses on a comparison, in terms of quality of programming, costs, and economic benefit to the State, of housing Hawaii inmates in mainland facilities and the federal detention center in Honolulu, with housing Hawaii inmates in Hawaii facilities operated by the State.  The auditor is directed to, among other things:

     (1)  Address the closure of the Kulani correctional facility as part of its analysis in conducting this comparison; and

     (2)  Make a recommendation on whether the continued housing of Hawaii inmates in mainland facilities and in the federal detention center in Honolulu is advisable, in view of the explicit requirements of the Community Safety Act of 2007 and its subsequent amendments.

     SECTION 3.  The auditor shall report its findings and recommendations to the legislature no later than twenty days prior to the convening of the regular session of 2011.

     SECTION 4.  This Act shall take effect upon its approval.

 



 

Report Title:

Corrections; Kulani Correctional Facility; Corrections Corporation of America; Ad Hoc Committee

 

Description:

Directs the auditor to conduct a financial and management audit of the Department of Public Safety's contract with the Corrections Corporation of America and the federal detention center in Honolulu.  Effective on approval.  (SD1)

 

 

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