TYT: Prisoners Hired As Firefighters

[alp227]

Run time: 06:13 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amdGBqosQ8Y   Posted on YouTube: October 11, 2011 By YouTube Member: TheYoungTurks Views on YouTube: 303   Posted on DU: October 12, 2011 By DU Member: alp227 Views on DU: 1163

 
A Georgia county (Camden County) is proposing to have non-violent prison inmates fight fires for free. Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian discuss the downside to this plan.

Similar thing with inmates happened in Wisconsin.

[monmouth]

1. My ex-husband was a volunteer fireman from the time he was 18

years old, moved up to Chief and eventually became the County Fire Marshal. I cannot believe this nonsense. He was constantly required to take classes and various courses, he learned about arson and all that goes with that. It really ticks me off the cavalier attitude these people have. There's a lot more to putting out a fire than holding a hose.

[alp227]

3. Good for him, do you think volunteer firefighting is appropriate rehab for nonviolent criminals?

the TYT hosts expressed some skepticism especially given all the union-busting by Republican states and safety concerns for the regular firefighters.

[lonestarnot]

2. I think this has also happened in AZ.

Didn't look for a link, but I think I recall them being used as hotshots.

[Sirveri]

4. Give them training and pay them a proper wage and I'm sort of OK with this.

But my guess is that they won't train them, won't give them more a proper wage, and are simply looking for more slave labor to use to bust another public sector union.

[prairierose]

6. Ding...ding....ding...and we have a winner...

this is the idea behind all of these uses for prisoners. The private prison industry can make profit 2-3 ways if prisoners are used in this way. And the word "used" was deliberate there. the criminals running these corps like CCA lobby for harsher penalties and laws that criminalize behavior, such as protesting.

[JoeyT]

5. Forcing prisoners to do dangerous jobs for no pay against their will?

Sounds positively Soviet to me.

Even without that, this is a terrible idea. Volunteer and regular fire departments have enough trouble equipping and training ourselves. Stick a godawful turnover rate in there and you can expect costs to go up, not down. And there will be a godawful turnover rate. Prison workers are treated like crap and given the most dangerous jobs in factories, I can't imagine what their taskmaster will set them to doing in this job.