SD's Project Prison Reset: What's next
PIERRE, S.D. (KELO) — Project Prison Reset's task force in South Dakota has started to mold their specific recommendations: 1,500 to 1,700 beds at a maximum cost of $600 million located at existing Department of Corrections facilities or proposed locations in the Worthing, S.D. or Mitchell, S.D. areas.
'This is not final action,' task force member and Republican state lawmaker Jon Hansen said Tuesday. 'This is not anybody agreeing to a final plan. This is just getting these options on the table, show us what we can do within the constraints that we're setting forth, and hopefully we have something that we can agree upon, particularly as a legislature on two-thirds' vote.'
NOPE says yep to Project Prison Reset's site selection
Eventually, the plan is for the entire state legislature to learn about what the task force recommends. And, of course, what the House and Senate decide to do with that information will be their decision. JE Dunn Construction was a contractor for the project with a guaranteed maximum price of $825 million that failed to receive legislative approval in February, and they continue to work with the state. Now, options for consideration in the near future are top of mind.
'So our next meeting is in five weeks,' Lt. Gov. VenHuizen and task force chair said Tuesday. 'Do you think you can have that in five weeks?'
'We will have a version that, yes, we can talk through,' Vance McMillan, senior vice president of the justice group at JE Dunn, said in response Tuesday. 'To say that it's going to be complete, I can't give you that commitment 'cause there's too many options on the table. There will be some options that we can bring to the table, but to say that it would be the one, like I said, that solves all the problems, I can't give you that commitment. If I was nervous about anything, it's the bed count.'
The project that failed to get legislative approval in February was designed to last 100 years.
'To get to your dollar amount, we're going to have to look at all options,' McMillan said. 'So, we're going to come in with things that do not meet 100-year building facility. I'm just going to be honest with you.'
And, as McMillan says, as 100 becomes 50, pricier challenges will eventually be on the horizon.
'You're going to solve the problem now, but you're kicking a can that you're going to have another problem in 40 years, 50 years, and you're going to go, have to go build something again, and it's going to be twice as expensive then,' he said.
Project Prison Reset's task force has already endorsed replacing the aging South Dakota State Penitentiary. Their next meeting is scheduled for July 8.
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South Dakota is on track to spend $2 billion on prisons in the next decade
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Some Democratic-led states have worked to close prisons and enact changes to lower inmate populations, but that's a tough sell in Republican-majority states such as South Dakota that believe in a tough-on-crime approach, even if that leads to more inmates. For now, state lawmakers have set aside a $600 million fund to replace the overcrowded 144-year-old South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls, making it one of the most expensive taxpayer-funded projects in South Dakota history. But South Dakota will likely need more prisons. Phoenix-based Arrington Watkins Architects, which the state hired as a consultant, has said South Dakota will need 3,300 additional beds in coming years, bringing the cost to $2 billion. Driving up costs is the need for facilities with different security levels to accommodate the inmate population. Concerns about South Dakota's prisons first arose four years ago, when the state was flush with COVID-19 relief funds. 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