AUSTIN—The Texas Board of Criminal Justice approved a contract Thursday that will allow prisoners to use telephones on a prepaid and collect call basis, ending the last ban on state prisoner phone use in the nation.

Kansas-based communications company Embarq was awarded the seven-year contract that will allow an estimated 120,000 Texas inmates up to 120 minutes of phone time a month.

Currently, most state prisoners are allowed one five-minute collect call every 90 days. The new system will allow them up to 15 minutes per call. About 36,000 inmates with disciplinary problems, gang affiliations or on death row won’t be allowed to participate in the new phone system.

Texas is the last state in the nation to allow prisoners to have regular telephone access.

“The fear was that allowing the inmate to have access to telephones could allow them to continue their criminal enterprises outside the prison walls,” said Michelle Lyons, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. “There also was a concern that they also would be able to contact their victims. But technology has advanced to a point where those concerns are really no longer valid.”

Embarq’s proposal includes technology that allows officials to monitor and record all calls except those with the inmate’s attorney. Calls will be limited to friends and family on the prisoner’s approved list of visitors. Calls to victims or the victims’ families will be prohibited.

Inmates and their families can prepay for telephone calls at rates of 23 cents for in-state calls and 39 cents for out-of-state calls. Collect calls will be 26 cents and 43 cents, respectively.

International and cell phone calls will not be allowed.

An Embarq spokesman said the system will be phased in at more than 100 prisons over the next year.