The closer to the deadline for the prison petition, the more heated things get.

Petition organizers Robert Palmer and Charles Wheat stood outside St. Mary Basilica after Mass Saturday asking people to sign the petition.

Tuesday is the deadline for a petition asking for a vote on the issue.

The men said they were hoping to get signatures after an announcement during the service declared the official stance of the Catholic bishops on the issue.

An announcement in the bulletin passed out Saturday addresses the private prison proposal.

“The Catholic bishops have made it clear that for-profit prisons are morally unacceptable,” it reads. “In light of the fact that a prison of this kind is under consideration for Adams County, we suggest that an election be called.”

It asks members to sign the petition asking for a vote, and is signed by the bishop liaison for the Catholic Committee of the South.

Palmer said he and others would try to present the petition outside other churches Sunday morning.

“We want to make it easier on some of the older people,” Palmer said. “If people don’t execute their right to vote now, they can’t complain later. I’m going to have a clear conscience because I’m trying to give people the right to vote.”

Standing alongside Wheat was church member Kirk Bartley, who said he wanted to dissuade people from signing the petition.

The two engaged in impassioned conversations with each other and congregation members.

An election would cost the county thousands of dollars and drive away CCA and the potential jobs it would provide, Bartley said.

It was the Catholic bishops against private prisons, not necessarily the Catholic congregation, he said.

“They’re going to build it somewhere,” Bartley said to one listener.

“We’ve got to decide if we want it here or somewhere else.”

A handful of congregation members signed the petition, but the petition organizers would not reveal the number of signatures they had gathered.

If a petition has 1,500 signatures, it will force the county to hold an election on the issue.

Two private corrections companies are looking at locating a federal facility in Adams County.

One, Corrections Corporation of America, is also looking at Walthall County.

CCA has made it clear that they will look more closely at Walthall County if Adams County holds an election.

Company representatives have said the timing — trying to meet GO Zone incentive deadlines — means that an election would take up too much time.

A signature on the petition, they say, is as good as a vote against the prison.