 |
| Rendering of how GEO Group Stadium would have appeared |
When the GEO Group and Florida Atlantic University agreed to a
$6 million football stadium naming deal in February 2013, neither GEO CEO George Zoley or FAU President Mary Saunders anticipated the incredible backlash that descended upon the private for-profit prison company (GEO) and the University. Due to student protests, faculty opposition, national media attention being drawn to GEO's terrible record of
human rights violations in its private prisons, and the quickly attached nickname of "Owlcatraz" to the FAU Owls football stadium, GEO Group
announced yesterday that it was
withdrawing its pledged stadium naming donation. In pulling its $6 million pledge, CEO Zoley released a self-serving statement blaming "distractions" as the reason that the pledge was being withdrawn. Per Zoley: "What was originally intended as a gesture of GEO's goodwill to financially assist the University's athletic scholarship program has surprisingly evolved into an ongoing distraction to both of our organizations."
The "surprising[] . . . distractions" to which Zoley refers include (a) student protests challenging FAU to reject the donation as hypocritical pointing out that GEO Group's profit base is derived almost entirely from human misery and suffering, (b) an overwhelmingly passed faculty resolution calling upon President Saunders to cancel the deal because GEO Group's "business practices do not align with the mission of the university," (c) a sit-in held in President Saunder's office by students, (d) a mocking national spotlight from Stephen Colbert's comedy/news show (suggesting that one of the problems of drawing attention to your business, is that people will pay attention to what your business actually does), and (e) community outrage protesting GEO's intimate affiliation with an institution of higher education.
Private prison companies are perversely incentivized to generate profit based on human misery through working to increase the incarceration levels of United States citizens and immigrants. Private prison corporations pay dozens of millions of dollars to
lobby legislators for harsher sentencing regimes, new crimes that require incarceration (AZ SB1070), and increasing prevalence of private prison contracts based on dubious claims of efficiency and cost savings. Without providing any product or needed public good, GEO Group, the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), and other private prison companies profit in two primary ways that are incredibly objectionable:
First, private prison companies contract with state and federal governments to warehouse U.S. prisoners and are paid in taxpayer funds on a "per bed" basis. Essentially, taxpayer funds are being transferred from taxpaying citizens into the pockets of private prison company executives and shareholders for no recognizable good or service. Almost all of the recent emerging evidence suggests that private prison companies run prisons LESS efficiently, LESS safely, and LESS cost effectively than do federal and state governments. The
Lake Erie Prison report just released finds that CCA is so profit driven, that the CCA- run prison at Lake Erie does not provide proper supervision of prisoners and that drug use and violence are rampant, both in an attempt to avoid costly prisoner lawsuits.
Second, private prison companies
exploit the labor of the prisoners in their care by entering into contracts with companies like IBM, Victoria's Secret, WalMart, and McDonald's for prisoners to work for pennies with the contractual rewards paid into the coffers of the private prison company (thus to shareholders and executives). Prisoners are paid between $0 and $4 for the labor that they engage in sewing for Victoria's Secret, manufacturing for WalMart and McDonalds, with the fruit of their labor being paid to the prison company rather than to the prisoner.
Indentured servitude continues in our prisons in the United States and the GEO Group and CCA profit from these immoral activites.
That both of these profit sources continue in the United States today is shocking. That the students, faculty, and community at FAU recognized this appalling business model is heartening. The GEO Group's name will NOT adorn the football stadium at FAU. It appears that "surprising[] . . . distractions" of massive protest are just beginning for the private prison industry.
Moni Basu at CNN has just written yet another "take" on the American Indian mascot conundrum. In Native American Mascots: Pride or Prejudice?" Basu interviews Suzan Shown Harjo who brought the now famous case Harjo v. Pro Football, Inc., attempting to have the trademark for the "Washington Redskins" canceled because it is offensive, derogatory, and contemptible.
Baseball's antitrust exemption has recently been the focus of two unrelated news stories. First, in the continuing saga of the Oakland Athletics' attempted move to San Jose (see earlier Sports Law Blog posts from 2009 and 2012, respectively, for more background), San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed sent a letter to MLB commissioner Bud Selig on Tuesday requesting a meeting to discuss the A's proposed relocation. In the letter, Reed urged that a meeting could help avoid "additional litigation," an indication that the city may be considering whether to sue MLB to help boost the A's relocation efforts. Indeed, Mayor Reed's request comes on the heels of a threat last month from San Jose Councilman Sam Liccardo, who reportedly discussed "the possibility of San Jose or local businesses challenging baseball's long-standing antitrust exemption in a lawsuit, something he [said] private attorneys would take on at no cost to the city." Liccardo previously made a similar threat back in 2012, however, so it is unclear whether he or the city would actually be willing to follow through with an antitrust suit against MLB. Update (4/11/13): Bud Selig has officially declined Mayor Reed's offer to meet.
