On this point, there already is a solid consensus: Honolulu cannot continue to limp along with Oahu Community Correctional Center as it is, and really should not continue with the facility where it is. A correction course for the state’s correctional facilities is long overdue.
The accepted fact is that OCCC, located on Dillingham Boulevard in Kalihi, is stretched beyond its capacity. It’s bad enough that the American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii filed a complaint in November with the U.S. Department of Justice, charging that substandard conditions exist in the entire correctional system but noting that OCCC specifically was 177 percent overcrowded.
“Though OCCC is designed to house 628 inmates, it currently holds 1,109 inmates,” the ACLU asserted in the complaint, adding that the overcrowding is chronic, with intake ranging between 176 percent and 202 percent of capacity since at least 2011.
Whether or not legal action ensues from this complaint it’s time for action. Lawmakers last session mandated the state Department of Public Safety, which oversees prisons and jails such as OCCC, to conduct a site study, the first step toward replacing the Dillingham facility.
That study was delivered on Wednesday with word that officials now have narrowed a list of 11 sites in the study to four top finishers, in this order:
>> The Animal Quarantine Facility on Halawa Valley Street.
>> The current OCCC location.
>> Halawa Correctional Facility, near the quarantine site.
>> Mililani Technology Park’s Lot 17.
The top finisher seems a promising location — in an industrial zone but not so far from town that transport will be a problem. Mililani, by contrast, seems too distant to be practical.
Even though the current site ranked second highest on the study’s scoresheet, rebuilding the center there would be a bad investment for the long term.
OCCC’s location made more sense when the compound was built in 1975. Because its population is generally waiting for trial or final release, there are frequent court appearances to be managed, and the urban location works for transportation purposes.
But in the intervening decades the land has become much more valuable, needed for other uses.
All 11 sites on the study list were selected because they are around 20 acres in size. In particular, the Dillingham correctional campus sits on 16 acres in the midst of a zone envisioned for transit-oriented development, with the planned elevated rail guideway running down the middle of the street.
Whether or not the fiscally troubled rail project is finally built along that alignment, properties of that size, especially when located in the urban core, are better used for affordable housing, to name one primary purpose.
Department Director Nolan Espinda acknowledged in a hearing a month ago that limiting the search to larger parcels may have been a mistake, given that a more compact, high-rise design was possible, one patterned after the Federal Detention Center near the airport. He added that the department also would consider late proposals of that type.
However, Public Safety should not needlessly prolong the process. It’s time to advance to the preparation of the required environmental impact statement (EIS), a step that will afford the opportunity to consider other sites.
And ultimately, choosing a larger site would allow for expansion in the future and may prove to have been the correct course to follow.
Despite ongoing efforts to shrink the prison population through probation and drug-treatment policies, current projections suggest that some growth could be expected in the short term.
While the census of males held in detention before trial at OCCC is declining, the “pre-release” population — those nearing the end of their sentence and about to return to the community — is growing, according to the department report.
That’s by design. Officials wrote in the report that pre-release “is recognized throughout the country as a best practice in corrections that is cost beneficial and has the potential to reduce recidivism.”
Replacing OCCC is an expensive prospect, costing $673 million by some estimates. If it’s designed for efficiency, it could save the state about $3.8 million.
It’s important that the state plan the project with due deliberation and community input so the best outcome is achieved. But the state has to get off the dime and move this project ahead.
The ACLU complaint cites its own prior litigation pressing for better correctional facilities, culminating in a consent decree in 1999. Nevertheless, the crisis has recurred, according to the complaint, given “the indifference of state officials and legislators to these circumstances.”
That sounds as if further court action could be imminent. Clearly, the clock is running out for addressing the shameful state of corrections in Hawaii.
