NEWS

September 19, 2007
Guards: Keep old cells - Fort Madison needs them,
plus new prison, union leader says

Fort Madison Union leaders told legislators Wednesday they oppose closing the maximum-security cellblocks at the Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison, saying the state needs the beds to house the state's burgeoning prison population.

Iowa's prisons are overcrowded and critically understaffed, AFSCME Iowa Council 61 President Danny Homan told state prison system planning study committee members, who toured Iowa's only maximum-security prison in the morning.

"I understand we have to fix the buildings and we need the infrastructure, but none of those things keep the inmates inside the walls," Homan said. "It is the staff that keeps the inmates inside the walls."

State officials are debating whether to renovate or replace the aging penitentiary, which came under scrutiny two years ago when two inmates escaped over its walls.

In a comprehensive study of the state's prison system, an independent consultant recommended spending $110.2 million to build a new maximum security prison on one of the existing prison farm sites or undertaking a $132.1 million redesign of the prison in Fort Madison.

On Monday, the state Board of Corrections endorsed the first option -- one that would mean abandoning the older buildings inside the Fort Madison prison walls.

"Why not use perfectly good cellhouses within the current prison?" Homan said. "We will not support shutting down the inside of the prison."

The 10-member joint study committee is charged with reviewing the prison recommendations and reporting to the Legislature when it reconvenes in January.

But Homan said the state needs both the new 800-bed maximum-security prison facility and the current beds inside the Iowa State Penitentiary, adding that current crowded conditions are dangerous to staff, inmates and the public.

Iowa's prisons, with 8,927 inmates on Wednesday, are at 122 percent of capacity, according to the state Department of Corrections. Some 583 inmates are inside the Fort Madison prison.

The consultant's report recommends keeping open Fort Madison's Clinical Care Unit, opened in 2003 to house 200 of the state's mentally ill and mentally disabled inmates. It is located outside the prison's stone walls.

It also recommended keeping open the John Bennett facility, also outside the Fort Madison prison walls, where 174 medium-security prisoners are housed.

And it recommends closing the old-style cellblocks, where cells are laid out in a straight line with an adjacent corridor -- an arrangement that is staff-intensive, prison spokesman Ron Welder said.

He said the old buildings -- built between 1906 and 1920 -- also are difficult to heat and suffer chronic plumbing problems.

"Everything in this unit is old," said Darrell Moeller, unit manager of cellblock 319. "We had a door today -- the key got stuck because the tumblers are so old."

He said prison staff had to remove the door to let the inmate out of his cell.

"Those are all things that could be cheap to fix," Homan said. "We're not talking about the downtown Hilton. It's a prison."

State Sen. Jeff Angelo, R-Creston, said committee members would consider the union's concerns but would look at the big picture when making their recommendation.

He said the Legislature will have to consider other infrastructure needs in the state, like roads and bridges, when it decides how to act on the proposals.

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