WY: What’s on your plate? Prison labor?

The next bite of fish or mushroom you take might have been grown in a prison. Part of the multi-million dollar expansion of the women’s prison in Lusk, Wyoming, includes the construction of a fish farming facility that will grow tilapia. Live fish will be exported from the prison to Colorado for processing. Sixteen women and two guards will be employed by the project.

The first private company to contract with Wyoming Department of Corrections for prison labor was Wind River Mushrooms LLC. The company grows 70,000 pounds of white button and portabella mushrooms a week at the Wyoming Honor Farm. Thirty-five incarcerated people make compost for growing mushrooms and plant the spores. Sixteen non-prisoners pick the mushrooms. Prisoners are paid $5.15 an hour and are required to save 15% of that up to $2,500. 15% goes to the Crime Victims Compensation Fund, and the rest is split between child support, restitution, and the Wyoming Department of Corrections.

This news brief is based on an article from the Casper Star-Tribune Fish, mushrooms help grow prison jobs.  If this link is broken, please check the archive of the newspaper listed.