King pushes back on prison plan

State Sen. Bryan King of Green Forest has been an outspoken critic of Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ plans to construct a new state prison in Frankl i n County, and he says he won’t g o along just to appease the governor.

“Are these representatives going to go: ‘Wait a minute, here. We need to look at this,’ rather than just bend over for what the governor and the special interests want?” King said during an interview with the Carroll County News earlier this month.

Sanders announced in October 2023 that the state had purchased 815 acres in Franklin County for a new 3,000-bed prison that she said will employ nearly 800 people.

King said he doesn’t believe the Frankin County site has the necessary infrastructure or available workforce to sustain such a facility.

“Basically, you’re building a 3,800 population city from scratch,” he said. “It’s way out in the country. It would be the equivalent of building it in Farewell or Denver. How are you going to get 800 people to come in there and work?”

King also disagrees with Sanders’ estimate that constructing the prison will cost $470 million, saying he believes the final cost would be closer to $1.5 billion.

“These prison-building companies, they know once you’re in for $50 million, you’re in for as much as they want out of it,” he said.

Instead of building a prison in Franklin County, King proposes using $100 million from the state’s general revenue to hire more law enforcement officers in an effort to reduce crime. He also would like for the state to partner with cou nties on expanding local jails. Sanders has said that is not a “viable” plan, but King pointed out that just last September Sanders agreed to a plan for the state to take over operations of the Phillips County jail. In a statement, Sanders referred to that agreement as a “win-win.”

“We could take $2 million and do a bunch of partnerships with counties and have a win-win situation rather than put $1.5 billion into this disaster out there,” King said Monday, Feb. 24.

King also points out that a few Arkansas counties are responsible for a disproportionate percentage of the state’s prison population.

“Eight counties are making up two out of three inmates,” he said. “Why does Franklin County or anybody else get stuck with the problem? … Pulaski County’s 13 percent of the population; they have 21 percent of the inmates. Jefferson County. If they don’t step up and start controlling the crime on the front end, or Benton or Washington County or whoever, we’re just going to have to build one more prison after one more prison.”