The Oregon Department of Corrections’ new prisoner communications service contract with Telmate significantly broadens the market for communicating with prisoners. In most U.S. prisons today, communication between prisoners and their friends and family outside of prison consists of in-person visits, paper mail, and telephone calls. In Oregon, prisoners’ approved family and friends can purchase additional communication services:
- online remote video visit with prisoner (66 cents a minute, with a 30-minute maximum)
- send text messages to the prisoner (44 cents per message, with discounts for multiple messages)
- send photographs to prisoner (60 cents per photo)
- leave voice mail message for prisoner (16 cents per minute, with three minute maximum)
In order to be able to receive text messages and photos, the prisoner must purchase a prison-approved MP3 player for $120 (4 Gig memory) or $140 (8 Gig memory). With the MP3 player, a prisoner can also download prison-approved songs for $1.75 per song.
This broader communication service market benefits everyone: prisoners and their family and friends, prison officials, prisoner communication service providers, and the general public. More communication between prisoners and law-abiding, caring persons outside of prison helps prisoners to re-integrate into law-abiding society when they are released. Everyone benefits from the associated reduction in crime. More communication between prisoners and their family and friends helps to keep prisoners busy and engaged in orderly life within prisons. That makes prison officials’ jobs easier. Moreover, email and video visits are more secure and provide better forensic resources than paper mail and in-person visits. That improves public safety. Prisoner communications service providers benefit from having a broader scope for their business. Since prisons typically receive a share of prisoner communication service providers’ revenue, improving the prisoner communications business generates more revenue for prisons.
Oregon’s expansion of the prisoner communications market is a good model for other state prison systems to follow.
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Read more:
- online video visitation with prisoners has large benefits
- email services for prisoners have high value
- prisoners are good customers for communications services
Notes:
The above description of communications service offerings in Oregon prisons is based on the newspaper article, “New technology helps Oregon inmates stay connected,” Oregon Live, published Sept. 12, 2012. According to that article, the Oregon Department of Corrections (DOC) receives $3 million in commissions per year from the communications contract. According to an Oregon DOC webpage, domestic telephone calls with prisoners cost 16 cents per minute (for both collect and prepaid), with a 30-minute maximum call time. International calls cost 50 cents a minute (for both collect and prepaid), also with a 30-minute maximum call time. Telephone rates and commissions vary widely across state prison systems. The Prison Phone Justice website offers excellent documentation of telephone rates and commissions in state prisons.