Correctional Facility Getting More Green
By: Marcy Foust
Updated: June 17, 2010
The Wabash Valley Correctional Facility is letting the green grass grow on more than 300 acres of its property in Carlisle. The "Prison Enterprise Network" came up with an idea to launch a hay baling operation.
It hired a local farmer to come in twice a year to bale the hay. The farmer gets two-thirds of the profit and the prison gets one-third.
Rich Larsen is the facility’s Public Information Officer. He says not only is the prison making money, it's also saving by not having to fuel up the lawn mower. “We're saving on the use of fossil fuels over $3,000 in savings right there. We're helping provide income to an area farmer so that's win-win. And part of it will go in to bio-fuel operations and we can also re-use some of it for our composting operation here at the facility. So it's win, win, win for everybody.”
Last year the hay baling operation raised $2,000. Some of that money went to feed horses at the Putnamville Correctional Facility where there is a thoroughbred retirement program.
It hired a local farmer to come in twice a year to bale the hay. The farmer gets two-thirds of the profit and the prison gets one-third.
Rich Larsen is the facility’s Public Information Officer. He says not only is the prison making money, it's also saving by not having to fuel up the lawn mower. “We're saving on the use of fossil fuels over $3,000 in savings right there. We're helping provide income to an area farmer so that's win-win. And part of it will go in to bio-fuel operations and we can also re-use some of it for our composting operation here at the facility. So it's win, win, win for everybody.”
Last year the hay baling operation raised $2,000. Some of that money went to feed horses at the Putnamville Correctional Facility where there is a thoroughbred retirement program.
