The $240 million Goose Creek prison project is under pressure after a Senate committee heard details last week on the expected costs of operating it. Talk by lawmakers of just leaving the prison empty drew a defensive statement Thursday from Wasilla Republican Rep. Wes Keller, who said it would be better to go ahead and put a private operator in charge.
"I believe the Mat-Su Borough and the State should sit down together and explore the possibility of a private corrections company leasing and operating the Goose Creek Correctional facility," Keller said in a written statement issued to news media.
Keller didn't return a phone call seeking an interview.
Private prisons have been controversial in Alaska. Wasilla Republican Sen. Charlie Huggins has said there's an "odor" about the prospect.
The federal corruption investigation into Alaska politics began as "Operation Polar Pen," an FBI inquiry into the push to build a big private prison at various locations in the state.
Bill Weimar, once king of Alaska's private halfway houses as owner of Allvest Corp., went to prison for helping finance a state Senate election campaign of Jerry Ward with an illegal $20,000 contribution. The charges said Ward, who lost in the Republican primary, would have supported Weimar's effort to build a large private Alaska prison.
Veco Corp., the defunct contractor at the heart of separate corruption cases in Alaska, was also part of the push for a private prison. Legislators backed successive plans for a private prison in Anchorage, Delta Junction, Kenai and Whittier, but all fizzled after local resistance.
Alaska now houses about 1,000 inmates in a private prison in Colorado. The idea of returning them to Alaska was among the main arguments for building the new jumbo prison in the Mat-Su Borough.
The Goose Creek Correctional Center, if it opens, would be by far Alaska's biggest prison at 1,500 beds.
The state expects to spend about $50 million a year to run it, along with $17.8 million in annual lease payments to the Mat-Su Borough in return for building it.
That compares with about $20 million a year to keep inmates in Colorado. Corrections officials said the cost of mothballing the Mat-Su prison would run $22.5 million a year, including lease payments, utilities and maintenance costs.
Keller is arguing that having a private firm take over the prison would be better than leaving it empty.
"We may not break even on those costs for a private operation, but it will certainly be cheaper than $22.5 million for nothing," the Wasilla lawmaker said.
But Senate Finance Committee Co-Chairman Bert Stedman said he's skeptical that going private would really make that much of a difference in the cost.
"I don't think its going to be big enough to close $20 million annual difference between mothballing the prison and operating it," the Sitka Republican said. "That's a pretty big spread."
Stedman said the state has to consider leaving the prison empty. Or maybe even just demolishing it.
"Demolition is kind of the extreme end," he said. "But when you look at $20 million a year for 25 years, you're talking one heck of an impact, you're pushing half a billion dollars."
Goose Creek is about 80 percent complete and expected to ramp up gradually starting in March 2012.
Alaska Corrections Commissioner Joe Schmidt said he sees legislators challenging the prison as a way to ensure that the state is getting the best deal. He said his agency is putting together information based on questions legislators have been asking.
"What they're going to see very soon is that our numbers are what they've always been; they're going to be honest and true. They'll make their decisions based on what they see back from us," he said.
Schmidt said his department will look into privatizing if that's what the Legislature directs. A Fairbanks lawmaker two years ago asked the department to study whether the prison could be run privately. The department did a quick analysis that figured a private operator could save the state about $6.5 million a year through lower benefits to people working in the prison.
Legislators decided at that point not to press the matter.
The corrections department said getting more precise figures would require the state to go out to bid and get proposals from prison companies. That's the only way to tell for sure how much they would charge to run the prison, Schmidt said.
Reach Sean Cockerham at scockerham@adn.com or 257-4344.
Important warning about e-mails purporting to be from the adn.com staff.