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Have your say about prison expansions
| Saturday, Mar 29 2008 12:00 PM
Last Updated: Monday, Mar 31 2008 7:50 AM
Environmental documents for expansion at Kern Valley State Prison in Delano are available for public review.
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Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed releasing 22,000 non-violent inmates early to help with the budget crunch.
That would save more than $354 million in the 2008-2009 fiscal year, according to his estimates.
In February, the Kern County Board of Supervisors decided to urge local lawmakers to work against the governor’s proposal.
Kern County District Attorney Ed Jagels said he did a rough estimate of how many Kern County inmates would be released from state prison under Schwarzenegger’s January plan to save money.
He estimates that about 2,600 inmates would be released over the year that follows implementation of Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal.
That number doesn’t count newly convicted felons who would be released after little or no time in prison, he said.
Jagels said his numbers required the assumption that the prison population from each county is similar.
He got his numbers, he said, by asking the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation what percentage of state prisoners are from Kern County and using that information to calculate Kern County’s share of the estimated total number of prisoners the governor plans to release.
— By James Burger, Californian staff writer
Copies of the Kern Valley State Prison expansion draft environmental impact report are available at these locations:
• City of Delano, Department of Community Development and Planning, 1015 11th Ave., Delano
• Kern County Library, Delano branch, government reference desk, 925 10th Ave., Delano
• City of Wasco, Planning Department, 764 E St., Wasco
If you’d like to read the report online, go to:
www.cdcr.ca.gov/Reports_Research/Environmental/index.html and click “Kern Valley State Prison Level II Infill Housing Facility Draft Environmental Impact Report.”
The deadline to submit comments for the Kern Valley EIR is April 21. Written feedback should be sent to: Roxanne Henriquez, Senior Environmental Planner, Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Division of Planning, Acquisition and Design, 9838 Old Placerville Road, Suite B, Sacramento, 95827; via fax, (916) 255-3030 or roxanne.henriquez@cdcr.ca.gov.
A public hearing about the report’s findings and suggested mitigation measures will be at 6 p.m. on April 8 at the Delano City Hall, 1015 11th Ave., Delano.
Kern’s four state prisons are bursting at the seams, according to population report data from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
As of midnight, March 19, counts were:
California Correctional Institution: 4,699; design capacity: 2,785
Kern Valley: 4,755; design capacity: 2,448
North Kern: 5,477; design capacity: 2,692
Wasco: 5,965; design capacity: 2,984
State prisons are overcrowded, and many inmates have to sleep in areas not designed for that use, such as gyms and dayrooms. Assembly Bill 900, which became a law in 2007, gave the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation the go-ahead to design, construct or renovate prison housing units, support buildings and programming space to add up to 16,000 beds at various facilities.
Draft environmental reports for North Kern and Wasco State Prisons may be ready sometime in July.
Tehachapi’s California Correctional Institution is at the end of the line. What’s proposed is a 110-acre standalone facility that could house 2,200 inmates, including maximum security offenders.
A public meeting about what issues should be considered for that expansion is scheduled for 4 p.m., April 14, at the Golden Hills Community Services District, 21415 Reeves St., Tehachapi.
Meanwhile, at Kern Valley, officials want to add a semi-autonomous facility for male inmates on a 35-acre site. The project includes five, 100-bed dormitory units; each unit could fit a maximum of 200 beds. Support services, health care, visiting and academic and vocational training buildings are proposed.
The draft environmental report identifies impacts and mitigation measures. Several impacts are significant, but could be made less so with appropriate mitigation, according to the report. They include:
• Air quality. Project-related construction dust could violate or contribute to existing or projected air quality violations. Proposed mitigation includes using sandbags to prevent runoff; limiting traffic speeds on unpaved roads; and stopping excavating work if winds exceed 20 mph.
• Electrified fencing. This may cause wildlife fatalities, particularly to migratory birds. A three-tiered mitigation approach is suggested, including using nets and anti-perching devices to keep birds away from the lethal fencing.
• Traffic. Cecil Avenue, where the prison is, has unsafe road conditions. Corrections officials will work with the city of Delano to determine what safety improvements are proposed along Cecil and the department will pay its share toward them. This may include installing some traffic signals or four-way stop signs at uncontrolled intersections.
• Utilities and services. The expansion will cause an overall increase in on-site groundwater pumping from a basin that’s already “severely overdrafted.” Even with flush-control valves on toilets and minimal landscaping, this is a significant and unavoidable impact, according to the report.