State prison kitchens are exempt from food safety inspections because prisons are not considered to be “food establishments.” Michigan’s two bills before the legislature would change the exemption, and require Aramark to pick up the tab.
Sponsored by representatives John Kivela, (D-Marquette) and Ed McBroom, (R-Vulcan), House Bills 4748 and 4749 are now under consideration in the House Oversight and Ethics Committee. The Michigan Legislature is in recess at this time but is expected to resume in about two weeks.
“Just in the past few weeks there was yet another allegation of maggots in food served by Aramark in one of our prisons, so clearly fining the company and the bad press they’ve received over previous incidents hasn’t helped get them to run a good food service operation or clean kitchens,” Kivela said in a news release, as reported by the Detroit Free Press.
The Detroit Free Press has in the past reported on numerous food safety violations at the G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility near Jackson, MI. It was also reported that an Aramark supervisor had told inmates not to talk about the violations. In response, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections called it an “isolated incident.”
Michigan contracted with Aramark beginning in 2013, replacing 370 state workers, and supposedly saving the state $14 million, in its prison kitchens. Aramark was awarded a three-year contract, amounting to $145 million to provide food services to Michigan’s 43,000 inmates. Since that time, there have been numerous problems with food quality and quality, in general with Aramark, according to Food Safety News.
To punctuate the problems Michigan has been having with Aramark, on January 29, 2015, Ed Buss, a former Florida and Indiana prison chief, and the overseer of Michigan’s three-year Aramark contract, abruptly left, returning to Florida. He had been on the job five months, starting Sept. 2, 2014.
The Michigan Department of Technology Management and Budget announced Buss’s departure but wouldn’t say why he returned to Florida, according to Crain’s Detroit on January 30.
Department spokesman Caleb Buhs told The Detroit News that Buss was an “at-will employee and served at the pleasure of the … director.”
According to the Detroit News, Buss’ salary was being paid out of a $200,000 penalty Aramark had paid because of some problems during the first nine months of the contract. The 2013 awarding of the contract quickly led to some controversy over a number of incidents of employee sex with inmates in prison kitchens, food shortages and menu changes that resulted in unrest.
Michigan is but one of several states with Aramark problems
In January 2015, the Kansas Department of Corrections acknowledged that food inspectors “have consistently found dirty kitchens and other food safety violations at several state prisons. The department does its own inspections, following Kansas Department of Agriculture food safety guidelines.
The inspections were conducted between 2013 and 2014 and covered seven of the state’s 10 prisons and 19 satellite units. Jeremy Barclay, a spokesman for the corrections department said administrative action can be taken if a food service provider isn’t meeting the terms of the contract. He also said Aramark, which provides food services at most of the state’s prisons, has shown it will take whatever steps are needed to fix the problems.
Mississippi is also having problems with food service in its correctional facilities, along with New Jersey. While Mississippi uses different food contractors, New Jersey uses Aramark. But regardless of the outside contract, all these corporations have jumped on the “big-money from locking up poor people” bandwagon.
We know about the huge profits made by private prisons, contracted to take care of inmates. They are paid by the number of bodies they keep, and it’s a very lucrative business. And just like the for-profit prisons in this country, Aramark and other companies just like them are using the same techniques to keep their profits high.
After Philidelphia-based Aramark went public in 2013, its net worth soared. Aramark now has contracts across the country to provide food service for over 600 prisons, and those contracts have proven its good business for corporate America to lock up our poor. They are able to make a profit by feeding prisoners for one dollar a meal.
Aramark moves into a prison, firing unionized workers and replacing them with non-unionized people they have hired. They are underpaid and receive little training or instructions. The meals are usually the minimum allowable calories acceptable, and often, far less than is required to keep someone healthy. The kitchens and utensils are often dirty, with pests and vermin, like mice and roaches running around. No one should have to eat food prepared in a dirty kitchen, especially by a group that only looks at its bottom line.
