The Empire Strikes Back

The Corporate/Bankster/Government Empire has stepped up their attack on our community. Going for broke, CCA backed by Bank of America and Wells Fargo working in conjunction with the Department of Homeland Security / Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the Town of Southwest Ranches is stepping up their attack on our communities in both the rural enclave of Southwest Ranches, and the All America City of Pembroke Pines.



Apparently, the Empire is going to spend whatever is necessary to get their way in defiling us with what they wanted to be a 2200 bed immigrant prison, the largest in the country, immediately adjacent to the Laguna Isles gated community and within a few miles of tens of thousands of school children.

They have enlisted the help of the Carpenters Local 79 and made thousands of robocalls to residents with the implicit threat that your taxes will be raised by $3MM if this prison is not allowed to be built.  Now, they are doing a mass mailing of a slickly produced brochure with even more lies than the robocalls contained.


We have embedded the brochure here for you to review.  Take a look at the front page containing the statement, Learn the Real Facts.  Okay, good idea!  Let's learn the facts.


We are told that we will get "New Jobs with good pay and benefits."  That's true to some extent. Certainly the white collar management will get good paying jobs.  Their CEO, Danon Hininger, made $3.3MM in 2010.  That's a great job! We are sure the benefits are good too.  We can't wait to see those types of jobs come in to our area, especially for all the politicians who have either joined the ranks of the unemployed or that soon will join their ranks.  If they are like mayors and politicians at other Prison Inc., sites, they'll be rewarded handsomely by their puppeteer.


But, let's take a look at the well regarded Ripoff Reports site and see what the average Joe thinks about his barely above minimum wage job.  One ex employee said this:

The company brought staff from other facilities to be promoted. We were also forced to work very long hours, in some cases three shifts in a row. We were never allowed to take any lunch breaks, even between shifts. Our paychecks were often several hours late, so when you got off of your shift, you would have to wait two or three hours to get paid on payday. Vacation and overtime pay was frequently left out of our checks, and when it was brought to the attention of HR, there were plenty of excuses on why they didn't have to pay it.

Just Google the web and you'll find tons of complaints just like this.

The next "Real Fact" is in the statement More Money for Local Schools.  Now if that isn't a bald faced lie, nothing is.  Just take a look at Bob Norman's Channel 10 piece which demonstrates that this wonderful partner with the Town has already shorted the county tons of money that could have helped our $120MM school district shortfall.   Norman says they shorted the county by $60,000 a year in property taxes because they put cows on the property for a few weeks in January.  As they bought the property in 1998,  that's like 13 years at $60k per year or almost $800,000 total and they haven't even got started!  Yeah, some friend of schools.

Looking at this a bit further, we find that the ONLY LEGAL CONTRACT IN EXISTENCE between the Town of Southwest Ranches and CCA has this clause in it::

This is their LEGAL and contractual statement of how well they are going to treat our schools through property taxes which are used almost exclusively to fund the schools.

They have demonstrated that they are predatory and will do whatever they can to avoid paying their fair share.  Lucibeth Mayberry has gone on record saying essentially that they will use whatever loophole they can to avoid taxes.


Also, we note that the new Superintendent of Schools, Robert Runcie has been dead silent on this issue even though we have written him directly many emails on the subject.  Runcie moved here from Chicago, if anything more needs to be said about where he's coming from and what his background is.
Digging deeper into the brochure, this tidbit is found:

Independent studies have shown no correlation between property values and proximity to a detention center of corrections facility.

Again, another bald faced lie.  The National Institute of Corrections / Department of Justice often cites an FIA / FAU study which specifically demonstrates the correlation of an affluent community in Goodyear, AZ being within 3 miles of what was a 1500 bed Arizona facility as causing a 12% drop in property values.  CCA is shamelessly lying.  The exact excerpt from the report is written up here: 
http://www.noprisonswr.org/2011/12/cca-lie-this-wont-hurt-property-values.html


Just read through this brochure and see how many lies you can find.   Lies about the openness.  We can't find any mention of this in the SW Ranches Comprehensive Plan, on their website, or in their budgets.  Their Town attorney implemented a Cone of Silence on the project because they were "asked" by CCA and ICE to do so. 

They have one goal and that is to rifle your federal tax dollars through per diem receipts to maximize the loot for their shareholders and senior management.  They could care less about you, your community or your homes.  But, you know that already.