Private Prison At Hinton May Close

HINTON, Okla. (AP) _ A private prison with about 500 state inmates may be shut down within two months. <br/><br/>The Great Plains Correctional Facility, which is owned by the Hinton Economic Development

Monday, January 29th 2007, 3:15 pm

By: News On 6

HINTON, Okla. (AP) _ A private prison with about 500 state inmates may be shut down within two months.

The Great Plains Correctional Facility, which is owned by the Hinton Economic Development Authority and operated by Houston-based Cornell Companies under a long-term lease, has sent notices to the nearly 200 employees saying their jobs may be terminated within 60 days.

The prison recently ended its contract with the state and in October and gave state officials 180 days to transfer about 800 state inmates. About 300 have been transferred and the rest will be moved by April, Department of Corrections spokesman Jerry Massie said.

Prison and DOC officials disagreed on how much the state should pay to keep inmates at the prison and at the time of the announcement, company officials said they were pursuing a contract with other agencies for the use of the prison space.

Warden Sam Calbone said no other contracts have been reached, but he hopes the prison will be able to find a new tenant in the coming months to prevent the prison from closing.

Calbone said the prison is required by law to notify employees of a possible termination in advance, but hopes the prison won't have to close.

``We're hopefully optimistic right now that it won't come to that,'' he said.