HILO, Hawai'i — Most of the Hawai'i women inmates serving time in a privately run correctional facility in Kentucky have signed a petition praising their Mainland prison and which asks that some of the women be allowed to continue serving their sentences there.

Lawmakers in recent years have been considering ways the state might return the women inmates to Hawai'i, including one proposal to house them at the Federal Detention Center near Honolulu International Airport.

State lawmakers this year approved a bill that instructs the Department of Public Safety to plan an expansion of correctional housing, medical facilities, drug treatment and other programs for women returning from the Mainland prison. Gov. Linda Lingle has not yet indicated whether she will sign Senate Bill 2082, which provides $100,000 for the planning effort.

The state contract with Corrections Corporation of America to house the women at the Otter Creek Correctional Center in Wheelwright, Ky., expires in October, and the bill suggests that housing the women out of state hurts the inmates' children.

According to the bill, national studies show children of prison inmates run a high risk of physical and mental problems, aggression, and criminal activity, and "children of Hawai'i prisoners incarcerated on the Mainland have an even higher risk of becoming troubled due to the geographical separation that precludes regular visits between parent and child and limits access to support services."

The April 24 petition signed by 94 Hawai'i inmates at Otter Creek and distributed to lawmakers and the media argues the women prisoners should be able to choose whether to return to Hawai'i or remain where they are.

Hawai'i is now holding 149 women at Otter Creek because there is not enough room at the Women's Community Correctional Center.

The petition acknowledges the inmates criticized conditions at Otter Creek after they arrived in 2005, including what some described as extremely poor medical care. Prisoners were particularly outspoken after the death of 43-year-old inmate Sarah Ah Mau, who died of a heart condition at Otter Creek in late 2005.

According to the petition, "we inadvertently fueled legislation to return all Hawai'i women inmates housed out-of-state to the islands." Since then, "so much has changed for the better," according to the letter.

The document lists and praises educational, recreational and drug treatment programs at Otter Creek, cites improvement in healthcare services there and reminds lawmakers that the state saves money by housing convicts in privately run prisons on the Mainland.

'BIZARRE' DOCUMENTS

The petition and the letter attached to it were greeted with skepticism by Kat Brady, coordinator of the Community Alliance on Prisons, who called the documents "bizarre."

Inmates are not generally permitted to circulate petitions, and a number of the women who signed this petition have been outspoken critics of conditions at Otter Creek, she said.

"My question is, did the women know what they were signing? What were they told? And who actually initiated this?" she said.

Shari Kimoto, administrator of Public Safety's Mainland branch, said the inmates told her they were beginning the petition after they learned lawmakers were seriously considering a proposal to return them to Hawai'i.

Tommy Johnson, the Department of Public Safety's deputy director for corrections, said Hawai'i prison officials had nothing to do with the petition or the letter.

"We got a copy of it and were as shocked as anybody else to get it, but it just reiterated what we have been telling folks," he said.

"You don't bring back inmates, male or female, unless you have all the things in place that they already have" on the Mainland, including rehabilitation, education and job training programs, he said.

$50 MILLION A YEAR

Hawai'i prison officials have warned lawmakers they do not yet have the bed space or the necessary services and programs to return the women prisoners.

Johnson said Public Safety officials are still studying the bill to plan an expansion of Hawai'i programs and facilities for women inmates returning from the Mainland, and have not yet made a recommendation to Lingle on whether she should sign the measure.

However, the state has solicited bids from providers willing to house the women inmates on the Mainland after the current contract with CCA expires in October.

Hawai'i spends more than $50 million a year to hold about 2,000 men and women inmates in CCA facilities on the Mainland.