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| Corrections officials say reforms will prevent having to reopen prison farm |
| By adn.com- Jerzy Shedlock |
| Published: 11/02/2015 |
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The lead researcher for Pew Charitable Trusts working in Alaska to make recommendations for statewide criminal justice reform has repeatedly presented a hypothetical scenario to lawmakers and corrections officials: If nothing is done to reduce the inmate population, the Department of Corrections will need to open a “closed facility” by 2017. That "closed facility" is the Point MacKenzie Correctional Farm. Until early last year, inmates housed there tended vegetables and livestock. Now, a small crew of inmate workers is bused back and forth from the Goose Creek Correctional Center, another jail in the Mat-Su. DOC does not consider Point MacKenzie closed. The farm “remains fully functional,” said spokeswoman Sherrie Daigle. But the 128 beds at the farm aren’t being used, which saves $2.5 million. If no additional reforms are made, those Point MacKenzie beds will be needed, said Terry Schuster, Pew senior associate for the Public Safety Performance Project. But DOC says changes are in the works to prevent that. Schuster shared this worst-case scenario with a crowd of people who help prisoners readjust to public life during a meeting at the Dena’ina Center in downtown Anchorage last week. He also shared it at a legislative hearing in mid-September and a workshop at this year’s Alaska Federation of Natives conference. Read More. |
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