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Search Menu Home eEdition Today's Events Photo Galleries Video Weather Archive Autos Classifieds Jobs Limelight Deals Real Estate About Sign Up for Alerts Full Site Reset Password Login GRANTS PASS Funds sought to upgrade youth prison By By Shaun Hall Grants Pass Daily Courier February 24, 2015 - 12:01 AM The Rogue Valley Youth Correctional Facility, built 18 years ago on F Street behind the Grants Pass Wal-Mart, is showing its age. It's in need of about $1 million in upkeep alone and could use a new building for its high school and treatment programs. It would also benefit from a recreational field and a building to serve youths who are preparing for release back into the community, according to facility Superintendent Ken Jerin. A 10-year plan suggesting those changes went before the Oregon Legislature this week. The changes — $12 million in all — are similar to changes proposed for other youth prisons throughout the state. "Spend money now so you don't have to spend it later," Jerin suggested. The goal is to better serve inmates, so they don't return to prison. Jerin and Oregon Youth Authority spokesman C.J. Drake spoke last week at the prison, built in 1997 with a design that Jerin calls "more correctional" than rehabilitative. He now would like to see a school that looks more like a regular high school, in contrast to the current set-up for New Bridge High School of single classrooms that adjoin the prison's four living units. Nearly 100 inmates up to age 25 are housed at the prison. Combined with the new school would be a treatment center and next to those structures would be a recreational field, according to the plan. All would be east of the existing prison, which is shaped like a large square O, with a lawn in the middle. Eventually, a transition facility that Jerin called a camp — a place to serve youths getting ready to re-enter the community — would be built, according to the plan. Jerin said there's a national trend toward smaller facilities, which bring better outcomes. He said his facility might eventually house only 64 inmates. His agency's new thinking, he said, is to provide what he called "positive human development" by concentrating on a youth's strengths, giving the youths a sense of belonging, providing them a community connection and setting high expectations, all while keeping them and others safe. "We want to make the environment suitable to the culture change," he said. Some gains have been made. The current recidivism rate — the rate at which offenders wind up back in jail or prison within three years of release — stands at 28 percent, an improvement of 10 to 15 percent over past rates, according to Jerin. He would like to do even better. One way to do that, he said, is by putting "the right kid in the right placement for the right amount of time." The 10-year plan now being unveiled was requested two years ago by the Legislature, Drake said. "It's an at-risk population were trying to reform" and a physical plant "we're trying to bring up to modern standards," Drake said. Bonds would be sold to finance construction, the first phase of which — the school-treatment buildings, recreation field and maintenance work — would cost $10 million. A copy of the agency's 10-year plan can be viewed at oregon.gov/oya. Popular Today Man critically burned in trailer fire Missing teen possibly seen in Florida Two dogs perish in east Medford house fire Medford's second-hand law gets a second look Smell of trouble may spark marijuana limits Reader Reaction © Copyright Local Media Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | Local Media Group Publications | Full Site