Fayette commissioners detail plans, reasoning for potential new county prison site
Vacated approximately a decade ago, the former U.S. Army Reserve Center along Route 21 in Uniontown is being eyed by the Fayette County Board of Commissioners as the potential new location for the county prison. The commissioners received the deed for the site last week, according to Commissioner Angela M. Zimmerlink.
Vacated approximately a decade ago, the former U.S. Army Reserve Center along Route 21 in Uniontown is being eyed by the Fayette County Board of Commissioners as the potential new location for the county prison. The commissioners received the deed for the site last week, according to Commissioner Angela M. Zimmerlink.
Mike Tony | Herald-Standard
Vacated approximately a decade ago, the former U.S. Army Reserve Center along Route 21 in Uniontown is being eyed by the Fayette County Board of Commissioners as the potential new location for the county prison. The commissioners received the deed for the site last week, according to Commissioner Angela M. Zimmerlink.
Mike Tony | Herald-Standard
The Fayette County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday noted plans to convert the former U.S. Army Reserve Center in Uniontown into the new location of the Fayette County Prison.
At its agenda meeting Tuesday, the Fayette County Board of Commissioners reflected on the lengthy process leading up to its receiving the deed for the former U.S. Army Reserve Center in Uniontown, also touting plans to make the site the new location of the Fayette County Prison.
“It was well worth the wait,” Commissioner Vincent A. Vicites said, later alluding to the commissioners having voted unanimously in April 2016 to apply to General Services Administration (GSA) for several years.
After the meeting, Vicites said that it was too early to put a price tag on a potential new prison at the former U.S. Army Reserve Center, located at the Uniontown city limits along McClellandtown Road (Route 21).
Vicites noted that the price per square foot is to be determined and that the next step for the county is putting out an architecture and engineering-focused request for qualifications (RFQ), adding that state Secretary of Corrections John E. Wetzel has offered free consultation throughout the prison preparation process, including guidance on developing such a RFQ.
Vicites and Commissioner Dave Lohr looked ahead to locating the new prison at the site of the former U.S. Army Reserve Center, which was vacated approximately 10 years ago. Vicites emphasized what he said was the cost-effectiveness of the planning process so far, while Lohr alluded to the fact that the current jail is 130 years old.
“It’s time to make a move,” Lohr said, recalling that he had seen seven plans for a new prison sitting on a shelf in the county courthouse when he first ran for commissioner in 1995.
A study by the firm CGL last year recommended Fayette County construct a new 354-bed, 121,000-square-foot prison facility at an estimated average cost of $27 million, also proposing a $30 million alternative that would maintain maximum security inmates in the current lockup and construct an adjacent facility to house the remaining, minimum security inmates.
The previous board of commissioners rejected a plan based on an earlier study by Crabtree, Rohrbaugh and Associates of Mechanicsburg and RW Sleighter Engineers of Lemont Furnace to construct a 480-bed, 115,000-square-foot facility in Dunbar Township at a cost of about $30 million, which did not include property acquisition or infrastructure.
“That’ll be tremendous cost-savings, between getting (the facility) for zero dollars and … the reduction in number of beds,” Vicites said of acquiring the former U.S. Army Reserve Center rather than moving ahead with the previously shelved plan for a new prison in Dunbar Township.
Commissioner Angela M. Zimmerlink said the purpose for the county getting the deed for the former Army Reserve Center was “for correctional facility activities and the like,” adding that she was surprised that the public announcement included in the agenda stated that it was for the new location of the prison.
“Everybody thinks we’re going to be going out there and building a new jail there real quick,” Zimmerlink said.
Zimmerlink said Sunday that the commissioners’ application to acquire the property at no cost for correctional facility purposes was approved with deed delivery this past week.
Vicites said that plans for the current prison in the event that the jail is moved to the former reserve center are still to be determined, adding that it will not be demolished since it is included in the National Register of Historic Places.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania filed a lawsuit on behalf of four inmates last month against the Fayette County Prison Board on behalf of inmates over alleged inhumane conditions at the county prison.
The meeting did not include any public comment about the former U.S. Army Reserve Center site announcement, but it did include the commissioners placing on the agenda for its next voting meeting authorization of property appraisals for 250 McClellandtown Road, a parcel adjoining the site. The appraisals, to be conducted by a certified real estate appraiser and the chief county assessor, are required for the county to either purchase the property or take it through eminent domain, county Solicitor Jack Purcell said.
“This is the only other piece of property that would make up that whole tract that we would use for the new prison,” Purcell said.
Purcell alluded to the county having purchased a 0.15-acre parcel adjoining the 6.5-acre reserve center property in 2016, adding that acquiring the 250 McClellandtown Road parcel would bump up the property being considered for the prison tract to approximately eight acres.
Vicites and Purcell noted bipartisan support throughout the deed transfer process from the offices of several federal legislators, including Republican Sen. Pat Toomey, Democratic Sen. Bob Casey and Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Hollidaysburg, with Vicites adding that John Frick, regional director for Toomey, “started the ball rolling.”
“The federal government has a lot of hoops you have to jump through to get this done,” Vicites said.
“We have some work to do, yeah,” Lohr said of making a new county prison a reality. “But it’s going to be on the front-burner to get it accomplished this time. I campaigned on it, and I’m going to try my absolute best to make sure that it takes place.”