Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey says lease plan for prisons no longer an option AL.com 15 mins ago Mike Cason, al.com
Gov. Kay Ivey said today she would meet with legislative leaders to look for new ways to build prisons after a key deadline passed in her plan to lease privately owned prisons.
At an event kicking off her reelection campaign in Montgomery, the governor said the lease plan is no longer an option.
Ivey signed leases in February for two new men’s prisons that a developer team led by CoreCivic would build in Elmore and Escambia counties. The Alabama Department of Corrections would lease, staff, and operate the prisons under the plan, which has been in the works for more than two years.
What’s happened, what’s next in Alabama’s plan for new prisons?
Updated May 12, 2021;
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A plan in the works for more than two years for Alabama to lease three new men’s prisons that would be financed, built, and owned by private developers is in doubt because financial backers are dropping out.
The next step for Gov. Kay Ivey and the Legislature is not clear. But the governor says she will continue the push for new prisons. Legislative leaders agree they are needed.
Ivey and the Alabama Department of Corrections have promoted the lease project as the way to replace many of Alabama’s aging, overcrowded, and understaffed prisons and reverse decades of neglect.