$1 billion in prison expansions urged
By Johnny Brannon
Advertiser Staff Writer
Hawai'i should spend nearly $1 billion over the next 10 years to more than double the capacity of its prisons and jails, according to a consultant's report released yesterday.
If pursued, it would be the largest investment ever made in the state's aging correctional system after years of neglect and controversy.
The study, commissioned by the state Department of Public Safety, says the system is dangerously overcrowded, has been poorly maintained, and is in no shape to accommodate a projected increase in prisoners.
It calls for replacing the "community correctional centers," or jails, in each of the four counties, and for adding a new one on the Kona side of the Big Island.
The study, by Carter Goble Associates, also calls for building new medium- and minimum-security prisons and a secure substance-abuse treatment facility at unspecified locations.
Department of Public Safety director John Peyton said officials would review the report for several weeks before making any recommendations to Gov. Linda Lingle, but that more cells clearly are needed.
"We need to expand and we need to replace," he said. "The question is how to prioritize with the money that's available."
Others worry that building up prisons and jails will hurt efforts to expand drug abuse treatment programs outside prison.
"The prisons are in physically bad shape, and something definitely needs to be done," said Kat Brady of the Community Alliance on Prisons. "But my fear is that expanding their capacity will kill diversion programs, and that's really problematic to me."
She noted that Lingle's proposed budget for the coming fiscal year includes less than $500,000 in new money for treatment and job training programs for parolees.
Hawai'i's correctional system has a rated capacity of 3,369 inmates, but more than 5,650 are in state custody already. More than 1,000 of them are serving time in private Mainland prisons under contract to the state.
If those inmates were returned to Hawai'i today without building space for them, "Hawai'i would have one of the most overcrowded correctional systems known anywhere, at 168 percent of operating capacity," according to the report.
Hawai'i's prisoner population nearly doubled during the 1990s, and likely will include 8,320 prisoners by 2013, the study says, but "any number of major changes in public safety policy, law enforcement, sentencing laws or practices, or the economy could cause an increase in the rate of growth."
Brady said the main reason for increases is mandatory prison sentences for some drug offenders.
"It's ludicrous to think we can build our way out of a substance-abuse problem, especially when the administration isn't putting more money toward treatment," she said.
Lingle's spending plan for next year calls for an additional $35 million for repair work at jails and prisons, and to pay rent on more cells to ease overcrowding.
Peyton said it's too early to say whether any new prisons will be built soon, but a private firm's proposal to build a facility in Arizona for Hawai'i inmates may still be an option.
The master plan is an update of a similar study completed in 1991 that already had found chronic crowding and poor conditions.
The update says that since then, "there has been a substantial degree of facility deterioration, apparent deferred maintenance, and delayed needed improvements coupled with overcrowding beyond the design capacities of all facilities in the system."
The report warns that ignoring the problems "could easily lead to state or federal court intervention."
Reach Johnny Brannon at jbrannon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8070.
