SC Prison Farms Cut Down On Inmate Food Costs

Would you be able to feed yourself three meals for a total cost of $1.51? That's what the South Carolina Department of Corrections spends on each inmate each day. It's the lowest amount in the nation. The department gave members of the media a tour Monday of one of its farms to show how.

The farm at Wateree River Correctional Institution near Rembert in Sumter County is on 7,000 acres. There are two smaller farms, one at Walden Correctional in Columbia, the other at MacDougall Correctional in Ridgeville. Together, they produce all the eggs, milk and grits served to the state's 24,000 prison inmates, which saves taxpayers almost $400,000 a year.

But that's not the only savings from the farms. The department is expanding its dairy operation at Wateree by building a new $7 million facility. Now, it has 240 cows. After the expansion is operating next year, it'll have 1,000 cows.

That will generate 1.8 million gallons of milk above what the department needs, so it will sell the milk on the open market, further reducing prison costs.

Jamie Cantrell with Dairy Farmers of America says the prison's dairy is not competition for other dairies in the state because South Carolina doesn't produce all the milk that's consumed. That means producers have to ship in additional milk from out of state. The excess capacity that the larger prison dairy produces will reduce the amount that other dairies have to import.

Inmates do the work at the farms, which gives them valuable job experience and further cuts down on costs. They have to be serving time for non-violent crimes and have good disciplinary records. Warden Don Beckwith says every time a job on the farm is posted, inmates line up to get it.

He says, "Ask yourself, would you rather sit in a room that's the size, basically, of your bathroom all year long looking out a window, looking through fence and razor ribbon? Or would you rather be able to go outside, outside the fence, outside the razor ribbon?"

Inmates are also building the new dairy. Inmate Duane (the department does not allow inmates to be identified by last name or photo) is working on the construction, since he used to own his own construction company. He's been in prison for almost 7 years and has four more to go on a felony DUI conviction.

Despite 100-degree heat and 12-hour days, he says, "I'd rather be out here. It helps my time go by."

Besides the dairy, the Wateree farm also raises beef cattle that are sold to generate more money for food. The agency sold more than 133,000 pounds of beef in the last year.

A sawmill at the farm converts trees that fall on prison property into lumber that's used to build and repair prison structures. It has generated 372,200 board feet of lumber, saving taxpayers $182,400.

Wateree also grows corn on 1,800 acres of the land. A gristmill on the property grinds it into grits and corn meal that are fed to inmates across the state. Inmates eat more than 595,000 pounds of grits each year and more than 166,000 pounds of corn meal.

The farms also grow tomatoes, cabbage, cantaloupe, as well as wheat, oats, soybeans and milo that are fed to the cows and chickens at the agency's egg-laying operation.

Corrections Director Jon Ozmint says, "We just want folks to know that we're mindful of the fact that everybody else in the country, and in our state, is suffering through a stagnant economy and we're doing everything we can to be good stewards of their tax dollars."