Texas Prison System Running Out of Beds
The nation’s largest prison system, which already has tripled in size in the past five years, is running out of space and has to build more penitentiaries.
The Texas Board of Criminal Justice on Friday approved construction of two new high-security lockups, at a cost of $36 million each, and adopted plans for a third.
The 145,000-bed prison system will be full by January because of the low number of inmates receiving parole and because parole violators are being returned quickly to prison, officials said.
Between then and the time the new facilities are built, less-secure dormitories with about 107 beds each will be added onto 19 existing prison sites. The state is also looking at leasing space in county jails.
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