HARRISBURG — Closing two state prisons has emerged as a way for Pennsylvania to save money and take a step closer to a balanced budget, as lawmakers contend with competing funding priorities and a structural deficit.
On the potential chopping block are two medium-security facilities: State Correctional Institution at Rockview, in Centre County, and Clearfield County’s Quehanna Boot Camp.
Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration has the power to close these facilities without the consent of the state legislature. Officials originally said they would announce a decision by May, but in June said “considerations were ongoing.”
Still, Shapiro included the closures in his budget proposal earlier this year, projecting the change would save the commonwealth $100 million annually once fully implemented. Governors typically use their budget proposals to show fiscally wary lawmakers ways to save money while also pitching priorities they want to spend more on.
Whether the proposed closures are in the mix as Democrats and Republicans negotiate a budget deal ahead of the June 30 deadline is unclear. A spokesperson for state Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman (R., Indiana) did not answer the question directly, saying in a statement, “a key part of this discussion is ensuring correctional facilities operate as effectively as possible and taxpayer dollars are put to the best and most efficient use.”
While Republicans are often on board with cost-cutting as a principle, the two prisons are both in legislative districts with exclusively GOP representation. Some lawmakers have pushed back strongly against the administration’s proposal as a result, warning of devastating job losses and arguing there’s not enough financial upside.
Some justice advocates and Democrats also argue the state should prioritize different issues in its closure recommendations. Prisons with documented histories of environmental and other hazards affecting inmates, they say, should also be candidates for closure.
Shapiro based his savings estimate on recommendations from a state Department of Corrections (DOC) steering committee, which issued a report early this year on ways to save money and reduce staffing vacancies in Pennsylvania’s prison system. The report came out of a Shapiro administration initiative to find inefficiencies, known as the Resource Evaluation and Mission Alignment Project, or REMAP.
Rockview, the second-oldest facility in the state corrections system, houses nearly 2,000 people and employs 635 staff full-time, according to the most recent count. Quehanna Boot Camp is a six-month alternative program to standard incarceration that focuses on reentry services. It houses nearly 321 people and employs 234 staff full-time, according to the most recent count
The steering committee proposed Rockview for closure because it faced $74 million in facility upgrades in the coming years, and there was adequate capacity to relocate inmates and staff to nearby facilities, according to the initial committee report. The committee proposed Quehanna’s closure because the facility is not equipped with the security measures needed to house many higher-risk people, and there was adequate capacity to relocate incarcerated people and staff to nearby facilities.
The debate over the prisons remains fervent, and these closures aren’t guaranteed.
A 2018 law signed by former Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf requires state officials to provide written notice to the public at least three months in advance of an official closure announcement, and give stakeholders — including lawmakers and employee labor representatives — the opportunity to analyze the proposal and give feedback.
The DOC held public listening sessions about its proposal in April and said a decision would be made in May, before announcing in June that considerations were ongoing.
A spokesperson for the DOC did not explain what was behind the delays or when a decision would be made.
‘Everything I can to fight back’
State lawmakers won’t get a vote on whether or not to close these facilities. But state Rep. Dallas Kephart (R., Clearfield), whose district includes Quehanna Boot Camp, attempted a roundabout legislative path to saving both it and SCI Rockview last month.
When his chamber considered a bill to broaden the medication options for opioid use disorder in county jails, Kephart tried to add an amendment to expand these programs into Quehanna and Rockview for at least 10 years. The amendment was blocked by Democrats.
“I’m doing everything I can to fight back against [the closures],” he recently told Spotlight PA.
Part of the local concern over prison closures has to do with jobs.
The DOC proposal calls for the hundreds of staff to be relocated to other jobs within 67 miles of their previous placements.
However, in a letter to Secretary of Corrections Laurel Harry, Centre County commissioners raised concerns about employee redistribution, saying that nearby facilities do not have enough vacancies to take on the hundreds of Rockview and Quehanna staffers who would be displaced.
They also argued the state is overstating its projected savings because necessary, expensive renovations have already begun, and that between job loss and people leaving the area to look for new work, there could be economic losses of more than $100 million.
Kephart and state Rep. Kerry Benninghoff (R., Centre), whose district includes SCI Rockview, echoed those worries.
“You have competing areas of employment and some neighboring counties within those areas that don't have the strongest employment base, don't have any large major industries,” Benninghoff said, so losing employment in the region will have a significant impact.
In a public response to critiques, the DOC defended its cost-savings projections, saying that while some maintenance projects had been completed at Quehanna and Rockview, major projects posing significant costs to the department had yet to begin.
Benninghoff and Kephart, as well as Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association President John Eckenrode, said the state could just as easily save money by selling off facilities that are already vacant.
“Our budget continues to increase, and we're still paying millions of dollars in upkeep on some of the facilities that we've closed,” Eckenrode said.
The DOC confirmed that it still maintains the former SCI Retreat in Luzerne County and SCI Pittsburgh in Allegheny County. Spokesperson Maria Bivens said in a statement that the department “spent approximately $2.3 million maintaining those properties in the most recent fiscal year (FY23-24), funding the essential utilities to keep both properties safe and maintain them in proper condition so that they can be sold.”
The state Department of General Services has yet to decide next steps for the properties, according to Bivens. She also noted that selling the properties would require legislative action.
Republicans in districts affected by the proposed prison closures aren’t the only ones hoping to sway the state.
In March, the Pennsylvania Prison Society, a nonprofit advocacy group for incarcerated people, suggested the governor and DOC consider closures based on environmental concerns, recidivism rates, and potential to improve staff culture, as well as economic savings.
“It makes good budget sense in terms of programming and operations to decommission some of the prisons, both for their functioning and for the benefit of people incarcerated at them,” said Noah Barth, the Pennsylvania Prison Society’s prison monitoring director.
As examples, Barth highlighted the maximum-security SCI Frackville and medium-security SCI Mahanoy. Both prisons are close to abandoned coal mines, and Frackville in 2017 faced allegations of contaminated water.
Barth also mentioned SCI Fayette, the subject of a 2014 investigation by the Abolitionist Law Center, the Center for Coalfield Justice, and the Human Rights Coalition. The report examined the adverse health impacts, including cancer, of “about 40 million tons of waste, two coal slurry ponds, and millions of cubic yards of coal combustion waste” surrounding the prison.
The DOC enlisted the Pennsylvania Department of Health to conduct a report that year on the allegations against Fayette, and concluded the environment didn’t contribute to cancer risk.
The larger budget context
Between last fiscal year and this current one, Pennsylvania's budgeted expenditure for the Department of Corrections increased by more than $200 million, drawing questions and criticism from lawmakers who believe costs should be shrinking based on the system’s declining population rates.
Shapiro’s budget pitch this year — which factored in the proposed $100 million savings from closing Quehanna and Rockview — would make a more moderate increase of $38 million. That would bring the department’s total budget to more than $3.3 billion.
His budget proposal also noted why corrections costs are still going up. Prisons have fixed maintenance, staffing, and utility costs, so operational costs stay relatively stable even when populations decline.
The amount of its budget Pennsylvania spends on corrections costs isn’t unusually high. Of the state’s general fund spending, 7% went to this area in a recent fiscal year, compared to 5.6% nationally, according to the most recent National Association of State Budget Officers report.
Elena Eisenstadt is an intern with the Pennsylvania Legislative Correspondents’ Association. Learn more about the program. Spotlight PA is funded by foundations and readers like you who are committed to accountability journalism that gets results.