Joseph Skues's List: Drug War and other Fake Criminal Expense

• irst, it’s a big union with many unique work rules, so big changes are possible, he said. Second, nearly all pay to corrections officers comes from the state’s general fund, the financial area that most needs shoring up.

  Lawmakers went beyond Snyder’s cost-cutting plan to propose closure of the Mound Correctional Facility in Detroit and privatization of the Chelsea boot camp properly called the Special Alternative Incarceration Facility.

  The Chelsea facility has the equivalent of 135 full-time jobs.

• In the case of the boot camp, which has about 80 MCO members called corporals, he said privatization makes no apparent sense.

  “Out of the clear blue, they called for privatizing the boot camp,” Grieshaber said. “We’re totally perplexed why they would want to do that.”

  Lawmakers project savings of about $1 million through privatization of the Chelsea facility, although the basis for that estimate is not clear.
• “I am not aware of any study that says there would be a cost savings,” said John Cordell, spokesman for the Department of Corrections.
• “We haven’t even voted on whether we will sit down with them (earlier than usual),” Grieshaber said. “We aren’t ready to even think about it.”

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