Bidder Wants Papers Behind Prison Contract Company Says Its Bid Was $18 Million Less Than The One Idaho Accepted
One of the private companies that lost out in bidding to build and operate a 1,250-bed prison for the state of Idaho wants to know why it did not get the contract.
Wackenhut Corp. of West Palm Beach, Fla., has asked the state to provide all the documents used in making the Sept. 26 decision. Corrections Corp. of America, based in Nashville, Tenn., was chosen from among eight bidders.
State officials see Idaho’s first private prison as a way to meet demands from a rapidly growing inmate population without draining tens of millions of dollars from the state budget for prison construction.
“Our clients are still mystified as to why they were not the successful bidder,” Roy Eiguren, a Boise attorney for Wackenhut, said Friday. “Their overall bid, in terms of construction cost and operating cost, was substantially below CCA.”
Idaho Department of Correction spokesman Mark Carnopis said a number of other factors were considered besides cost.
“The bottom line was that we picked the most qualified bidder, based on an extensive review of all the bids,” he said. “We felt that CCA was the most qualified. We may be talking about two bids that are very dissimilar.”
Besides Wackenhut, Carnopis said the agency received a request from another unsuccessful bidder seeking more information about how the contract was awarded.
“They said they were trying to learn more about the bid process so they would be in a better position to bid on future projects,” he said.
A member of the Legislature’s budget-writing committee, Republican Sen. Cecil Ingram of Boise, said the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee will need to take a very close look at why Corrections Corp. of America’s successful bid was $18 million higher than Wackenhut’s.
“The people of Idaho need a better explanation than I can give them,” Ingram said.
Besides the two bidders, Gov. Phil Batt’s spokesman said the state received a Freedom of Information Act request from The Idaho Statesman newspaper in Boise. Filling each request will require thousands of pages of documents.
The bid award specified that a contract was to be signed within 30 days, which was about two weeks ago. But Carnopis said negotiations continue.
Many details need to be worked out in a contract that can approach $100 million, he said.
The agency expects to sign the contract in about a week.
Corrections Corp. of America manages 60 prisons with a capacity of 45,000 beds.
Eiguren said Wackenhut is second in market share with 30,000 prison beds in 47 facilities.
He said Wackenhut’s bid was about $10.8 million less to build the prison and more than $7 million less to operate over a three-year period.
In addition, Eiguren said his client promised to get the prison open four months earlier than Corrections Corp. of America - a big savings to a state paying thousands of dollars daily to keep hundreds of its prisoners out of state due to a lack of facilities.
Wackenhut did not file a protest over the bid award, and Eiguren would not comment on whether legal action might be taken later.
“All we are attempting to do is better understand the decision,” he said.
Meanwhile, Ingram said he would ask the cochairmen of the Legislature’s budget panel to review the bidding process. Neither House Appropriations Chairman Robert Geddes nor Senate Finance Chairman Atwell Parry of Melba could be reached for comment Friday.
Ingram said he also wants another look at the need for a private prison.
“I have serious questions whether we need to stick that extra $10 million in prison facilities at this time,” he said.
xxxx WACKENHUT’S BID Roy Eiguren, a Boise attorney for Wackenhut, said his company bid was about $10.8 million less than Corrections Corp. of America to build the prison and more than $7 million less to operate it over a three-year period. He also said his client promised to get the prison open four months earlier than CCA.