Prison Will Be Wired For TVs Cost Of Adding Cable Access Will Be Pulled From Contingency Fund

Idaho will fork over about $200,000 to allow inmates at its new private prison to have television sets at their bunks.

That’s already allowed at every other Idaho state prison. But Corrections Corporation of America, the private firm building and running the new state lockup, didn’t include cable for individual televisions in its no-frills design for the new 1,250-bed prison south of Boise.

“Was this left out inadvertently, something that would ordinarily be there?” asked Ralph Townsend, chairman of the state Corrections Board.

“Unfortunately, it was,” said Jake Howard, administrator of institutional services for the state prison system.

The three-member Corrections Board raised no objection to the expenditure in its meeting Thursday, especially after hearing that the money will come from an already-set-aside $3 million contingency fund for the $55 million prison. That means no additional money needs to be found for the television cables.

This is the first time any money is being drawn from that contingency fund.

“We haven’t had a change order, which is highly unusual,” state Corrections Director Jim Spalding said.

Ed Trotter of CRSS, a firm the state hired to oversee the private construction project, said change orders totaling 5 percent to 10 percent of the total cost wouldn’t have been out of the ordinary.

“We’re not even going to be in that ballpark,” he said.

Spalding told the Corrections Board that the limited cable television service Idaho offers inmates includes educational programming, prison announcements, some movies and other prison-selected fare. Inmates must purchase their own sets from the prison commissary.

The service is used as a management tool, both to help occupy inmates’ time and as a privilege that can be removed.

“When we went into the design of the facility, it was never brought up, and we didn’t think to bring it up because it was normal, standard practice that we had done,” Spalding said.

When Idaho recently moved 200 of its inmates from a county jail in Texas to a CCA-operated private lockup in New Mexico, it found that the New Mexico facility also lacked TV cabling. The state negotiated with CCA to add it to the New Mexico facility to keep the inmates’ treatment consistent.

Howard presented the board with several options on construction methods to add the cabling to the concrete prison structure, which is well under way but not scheduled to be occupied until next year. The options ranged in price from $190,000 to $238,000.

The board opted to leave that decision to its construction experts.

FAST FACTS Prison privilege Idaho offers prison inmates limited cable television service. It includes educational programming, prison announcements, some movies and other prison-selected fare. Inmates must purchase their own sets from the prison commissary. The service is used as a management tool, both to help occupy inmates’ time and as a privilege that can be removed.