It's true, after much public outcry from the bleeding hearts in Dane County , the Dane County Board has approved the new Dane County Jail phone contract as expected.

The plan costs recipients of the inmates' collect calls $4.25 to connect and $.10 per minute. According to Madison NBC affiliate WMTV, the Madison Urban Ministry Director Mary Kay Baum says the arrangement is "a super-tax on the most vulnerable and low income people in the county."

The up-side is that the plan provides $1.2 million in revenue for the Dane County Corrections system.

I will concede that the fees don't necessarily affect the criminal directly however I am certainly a firm believer in inmates paying for the services used during their incarceration.

So, to appease the 'poor criminal' faction of the Dane County population but to still require inmates to earn their 'three hots and a cot', here's my solution: put the inmates to work! It's the perfect way to punish the inmate and not the family while still lessening the tax-payer burden in the corrections budget.

I'm not talking about the stereotypical bed sheet washing and license plate stamping work; I'm talking about contracting out inmate labor for real jobs. They could pay off the costs of their stay at the Dane County Bed & Breakfast while learning skills that can be put to work once their incarceration is complete.

Let's create an all-around general contracting company - the Inmate Corps. We'd start with construction - inmates would learn valuable real-world skills such as masonry, plumbing, carpentry, road construction and more under the watchful eyes of guards and experts in the trades. Instead of paying third-party construction companies to handle various county road and structure projects, the county could pay the Department of Corrections Inmate Corps to complete the job.

For those inmates not suited for construction labor (and those not trusted enough to be given sharp tools) there could be a janitorial division. The inmate work force, again under the watchful eye of guards and janitorial gurus, could handle such tasks as post-game clean up at Camp Randall, post-even clean up at the Expo center, grounds keeping tasks on county property and regular janitorial tasks in the City County Building and Public Safety Building. Even private businesses such as East Towne and West Towne malls, Oscar Mayer, Central Storage and others could hire relatively cheap janitorial staff from the Dane County jail.

We wouldn't need to stop there, though - many jobs around the county could easily be done by inmates. Roadside trash pick-up, road kill pick-up, shoreline clean-up, mowing, lawn care, snow removal - just about every menial labor job could be completed by the Inmate Corps.

Those inmates not trusted or suitable for outside work could be required to perform in-house duties such as laundry. No inmate, no matter how short the stay, should be required to pay his or her own room and board.

I'd even be willing to throw the 'poor inmate' crowd a bone - we could "share" some of the revenues with the inmates such as a dollar or two per hour, placed into a savings account or paid to the inmates designee.

The revenues raised would be applied to the corrections budget, the inmates would receive training on not only marketable skills but also business ethics, local businesses would benefit from cheap labor for menial tasks and the inmates could pay for their own "exorbitant" phone fees. It's a win-win no matter which angle you view it from.

Disagree with my idea? Just call me collect.