The Montana Town That Wanted to Be Gitmo

The coils of razor wire glint in the prairie sun like silver tumbleweeds, piled against the chain-link perimeter fence around the Two Rivers Detention Facility in Hardin, Mont. Two years ago, the town (pop. 3,600) celebrated the completion of this $27 million state-of-the-art private prison, capable of holding 464 inmates. Convinced that the facility would provide employment for more than 100 people and a steady source of municipal income, Hardin and a neighboring town issued revenue bonds to finance its construction and turned it over to a for-profit prison-management corporation. On a 40-acre (16 hectare) field at the edge of town where pronghorn antelope once grazed, they built it. But nobody came.

The former governor of Montana had assured Hardin that the state's department of corrections needed more space, but the burgeoning deal fell through after a new governor took office in 2005. Then Hardin tried to lure business from other states, only to be told that Montana law prohibited incarceration of prisoners convicted out of state. Despite winning a lawsuit last June that would allow it to accept prisoners from anywhere, Two Rivers remains empty; its $27 million in bonds went into default a year ago.

Then a new source of hope appeared. Two days after his Inauguration, Barack Obama made his campaign pledge to close the U.S. detention facility at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, into an Executive Order. Quickly, the prison's backers made a new pitch: Why not house some of those 240 detainees at Two Rivers? On April 21, Hardin's city council passed a resolution to entice the detainees its way, saying it could provide a "safe and secure environment, pending trial and/or deportation."

On April 30, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a Senate committee there were up to 100 Gitmo detainees who could be neither tried nor released, and he requested an extra $50 million for a new facility on U.S. soil. Greg Smith, executive director of Hardin's Two Rivers Authority, says the isolated town could be a "good fit." Its facility is beyond "shovel-ready," he says--it's a turnkey operation.

Far from supporting their constituents' idea, the three members of Montana's congressional delegation have reacted swiftly, unanimously and negatively. "I understand the need to create jobs, but we're not going to bring al-Qaeda to Big Sky Country--no way, not on my watch," said Senator Max Baucus, a Democrat.

Some local taxpayers are livid at Hardin officials. "It's been a complete fiasco since the beginning," says Mike Carpata, a forester with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, as he shopped at Lammers Trading Post in Hardin's downtown. But others remain supportive of the project. The store's fourth-generation owner, George Lammers, notes that after subtropical Gitmo, the dry, wintry high plains "would be torture for some of those boys." He adds, "I think it would be great for all the law-enforcement people to be here. It would help our housing market. Our city fathers wanted the economic benefits, but I guess they didn't foresee the political controversies."