O.C. to seek state funds for jail plan
To get $100 million to expand one facility, it would have to turn part of another lockup into a 'reentry' unit.
Orange County supervisors voted Tuesday to seek $100 million for a long-stalled jail expansion despite long-standing opposition to the project -- and created new adversaries in the process.
County officials have been trying to expand James A. Musick Branch Jail outside Irvine for more than a decade but have been hamstrung by court challenges and funding shortfalls, even as a swelling inmate population left the jails chronically overcrowded. The county was under a federal court order until 2005 to reduce overcrowding; the system had an average of 1,600 more inmates per day than it was designed to hold.
In 2006, then-Sheriff Michael S. Carona adopted a plan to more than triple the number of beds at Musick, to 4,400 from its current level of 1,256. But the county had no way to pay for it and considered floating $250 million in bonds.
Now, under a new plan by acting Sheriff Jack Anderson approved by the board, the county will apply to the state for funding through a program designed to build jails and prisons with a focus on rehabilitation. The state has $750 million available for first-round funding of jail construction programs; the county's applications are due Tuesday, and grants will be awarded in May.
In return for the money to finance the expansion of Musick, the county would turn part of Theo Lacy Jail in Orange into a "reentry" facility to help state inmates prepare for their return to society. Nearly 300 beds would be set aside for the rehabilitation program, under which inmates originally from Orange County would return to serve the end of their sentences while taking classes to prepare for life on the outside.
The cities of Irvine and Lake Forest, which has houses just 700 feet from the Musick site on unincorporated county land, have fought the expansion for years, even suing -- ultimately unsuccessfully -- to stop it.
But the plan to create the rehabilitation facility at Theo Lacy brought instant opposition from Orange city officials, who said the county must get their permission for any significant changes in the jail's operation under a 1995 legal settlement.
They complained that the county had not adequately communicated with the city about its plans and said Orange was "already doing its part" to house county facilities.
"They have grave concerns," Orange City Manager John Sibley said of City Council members. "Bringing state inmates into the city of Orange is of concern to us."
