State Considers Prison Facility For North Idaho Minimum-Security Center With 100 Beds ‘Needed Up North’
State prison officials would like to build a 100-bed minimum-security facility in the Coeur d’Alene area.
The Idaho Board of Correction is looking for a site in Kootenai County for a community work center.
The center, patterned after five others in southern Idaho, would house inmates immediately before they are released.
There are two community work centers in Boise and one each in Twin Falls, Nampa and Idaho Falls.
But North Idaho has no such facility.
“We really, really think this is needed up North,” said Correction spokesman Mark Carnopis.
“If you did pins on a map, it’s a glaring deficiency we are aware of.”
Inmates with about eight to 10 months of remaining prison time who have been classified as low security risks reside at the work centers.
They work in the community during the day and sleep at the centers at night, Carnopis said.
Attempts to build a North Idaho work center have been in the works for years.
The state Department of Correction plans to ask the Legislature for $286,300.
More than $2.5 million in federal funds have been earmarked for building facilities.
Estimates are that by 2003, prison growth will be five inmates per month. At that rate, the prison population will exceed the bed space, according to the department’s budget request.
Plans call for a 21,350-square-foot building with security requirements.
“It’s a secured facility, but you won’t see the barbed wire,” Carnopis said.
The plan is to assimilate prisoners slowly into society so they can earn money, learn skills and become valuable members of society, Carnopis said.
“You don’t want to leave them out there with the clothes on their back,” he said.
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The center, patterned after five others in southern Idaho, would house inmates immediately before they are released. There are two community work centers in Boise and one each in Twin Falls, Nampa and Idaho Falls.