Lacy Expansion Makes Sense

The Board of Supervisors’ plan to expand the Theo Lacy branch jail in Orange to provide more beds has been on hold for the last two weeks awaiting public response to the idea.

The response, as expected, hasn’t been supportive. But it should be because the expansion plan, which the supervisors are scheduled to act upon Tuesday, makes sense.

On its face, expanding Lacy appears to be the fastest, fairest, least expensive and most logical alternative for easing the jail overcrowding problem. For more than two years the supervisors have been searching for ways to respond to a federal court judge who held the board and Sheriff Brad Gates in contempt for ignoring his 7-year-old order to resolve jail overcrowding.

The immediate problem is finding more maximum-security beds, which are now only available at the main jail. The new proposal calls for adding more than 1,000 beds at Lacy, a minimum-security lockup, at an estimated cost of $30 million, most of which would be state money. The sheriff would then transfer women prisoners from the main jail to Lacy and to a new Intake and Release Center opening next to the main jail this summer, thus freeing main jail maximum-security cells for male prisoners.

The Orange City Council is opposing the expansion plan and has asked the supervisors for a “complete and full environmental impact report” on the Lacy expansion. The request is reasonable and should be granted.

Since the federal contempt of court order in 1985, the county has expanded other branch jails, released some prisoners early, allowed others to serve their jail sentences in their homes and completed construction of the new intake center. Still, it cannot keep up with the growing prisoner population.

The Lacy branch jail is located in the county complex on City Drive in Orange, across from a retail-commercial mall. The county complex includes an animal shelter, juvenile court and other lockup facilities like Juvenile Hall and the jail ward at the UCI Medical Center.

Adding 1,018 jail beds at Lacy should not significantly change the area and it could be done within about 18 months, at a net cost of about $5 million in local tax funds.

No other alternative available to the county appears to provides those pluses. Anywhere the supervisors choose to locate a new jail, or expand an existing one, will raise opposition and may have some negative impact. But expanding Theo Lacy offers the least negative effect and the best hope for quickly easing jail overcrowding in the county until a long-term solution is found.