Pitchess Jail Tidying Up for Arrival of Female Inmates : Corrections: Up to 400 women will be moved from Sybil Brand Institute in September.

Like any good host, Jim Noennick is renovating his rooms for new guests.

Noennick, facilities coordinator for the North County Correctional Facility at the Peter J. Pitchess Honor Rancho, is preparing to house up to 400 female inmates beginning next month at the maximum-security jail.

This will be the first time in its 60-year history that the jail has counted women among its inmates.

New laundry facilities are being installed to accommodate the women’s clothing, indoor electrical outlets are being modified for hair dryers and stationary bikes have been requested for the fitness area. Cosmetics will be added to the in-house store’s inventory and the showers are being modified for added privacy.

“All we’re doing is trying to give them as much comparable service as they have had before,” Noennick said.

About 10,000 inmates are presently housed at the jail. The north facility, where the women will live, houses 1,600 males among four modular living areas.

Women will be moved into module No. 4 some time in September. Civilian employees worked in the recreation area nearby Tuesday, installing a gas line and electrical wiring for a washer and dryer.

Female prison inmates are traditionally given more amenities than their male counterparts, including the option of washing their own garments separately rather than depositing them in a central laundry facility.

“Women are more sensitive to hygiene than men are,” said Lt. Errol Van Horne, an operations officer at the jail.

Most of the women coming to the Pitchess facility were previously housed at the Mira Loma Jail west of Lancaster. Mira Loma closed two weeks ago because of Los Angeles County budget cuts, a move expected to save the Sheriff’s Department $15 million a year.

The 460 female inmates housed at Mira Loma were transferred to the Sybil Brand Institute in East Los Angeles, the county’s primary facility for female inmates. But that facility is so crowded that some inmates are forced to sleep on the floor.

Moving about 400 of them to Pitchess will provide some relief.

“It will give us flexibility we need from a divisional standpoint,” Van Horne said.

Authorities at Pitchess have also requested the addition of 12 female correctional officers to its staff of 140 deputies and custodial assistants.

The Pitchess jail, located on a 2,400-acre site near Interstate 5, began taking in lawbreakers in the 1930s. The county used it at first as a “drunk farm,” putting up alcohol offenders to work in the fields.

It expanded in the 1960s to include cattle raising, hay production and a dairy and hog farm.

But agrarian activities have been phased out in recent years--the dairy farm was closed this year--as it became cheaper to purchase products from outside sources.