Lawmakers seek prison products profits

AUGUSTA – With 600 lines of products created by Maine inmates, the state prison industries program sells $1 million worth of merchandise a year. But at the same time, the state spends $1.5 million to subsidize it, a lawmaker familiar with the program says.

“It’s a great program – but not on the backs of the taxpayers,” Rep. Stanley Gerzofsky, D-Brunswick, who ran the program for a while in the 1990s, said Tuesday.

Gerzofsky is also House chairman of the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee, which began a detailed review of the prison industries program that will include a look at profitable industries programs in other states and see which might work in Maine.

“Other states are doing this and they’re successful at it,” Gerzofsky said. “Maine should be.”

Many Mainers and travelers are familiar with the prison industries showroom in Thomaston where goods from model sailboats and lamps to jelly cupboards, bureaus and bookcases are sold. Other components of the program include upholstery and engraving.

The program dates back to the earliest days of the prison when inmates worked in the Thomaston quarry and built wooden wagons, sleighs and buggies. More than a quarter of the revenues now go back to the inmates, with some of that pay garnished for restitution they must pay for their crimes.

Lawmakers on Tuesday posed numerous questions about the program’s policies and finances and made some suggestions, such as selling over the Internet through a service like eBay. That would promote sales out of the country, since federal law bars sales of Maine-made prison goods in other states.

Suggestions also were made to open more retail shops for prison products and to improve the prison’s separate license plate production business, which the committee was told is profitable.

A report to the committee highlights programs in other state correctional systems, such as Oregon’s “Prison Blues” clothing line, which claims sales in the United States as well as Europe, Japan and New Zealand.

Utah has an extensive industries program that includes such diverse elements as asbestos removal, roofing services and meat processing. Florida’s numerous prison industries include vehicle refurbishing, tire remanufacturing and food processing.

In Maine, the criminal justice committee will likely hold three sessions before it has to submit a report to the Legislature in January.

But Gerzofsky said that in the process, the panel will likely delve into thornier issues of prison overcrowding and Gov. John Baldacci’s proposal to have the state Corrections Department take over the county jails.

The latter proposal has drawn fire from officials in several counties, including Somerset, which is in the process of building a new $30 million jail. Baldacci met with Somerset officials on Monday.