$4.8 million facility built at Lancaster

By Carrie A. Mizell

An increase in the number of youthful offenders at Lancaster Correctional Institute has prompted construction of a new 29,240 sq. ft. housing facility.
Once completed the two-story facility will house 240 additional inmates and bring with it 18 new jobs.
Buddy Roberts, warden at Lancaster Correctional, said the state prison system is currently in a hiring freeze; however, the new facility will require 13 new correctional officers and five sergeants to be hired in the future.

Lancaster Correctional Institute’s new housing facility is shown in the foreground
in a photograph taken from State Road 26.

Despite rumors circulating throughout the community that the prison’s new facility will begin housing hardened adult criminals, Roberts indicated that the prison’s current profile of housing only youthful offenders will remain the same.
The $4.8 million facility, which is being built by A.D. Morgan Construction, should be completed in August, before going online in October to meet the influx of youthful offenders entering the state prison system.
According to Roberts, the new self-contained, energy efficient facility will feature all electronic locks, a closed circuit television system and a de-humidifying system, rather than an air conditioner. The facility is broken down into four quads, and boasts an inmate canteen, a barber shop and a medical room, along with numerous two-person cells and a large officers’ station in the center of the facility.
“This will be a much more secure facility than the cottage dorms we currently have, which were built in the late 1960s to house juvenile delinquents,” Roberts said. “A lot of our employees have never worked in a facility like this, so they are excited to get in it.”
According to Roberts, a new wastewater treatment plant and a new maintenance building are also being constructed at Lancaster Correctional outside the perimeter fencing.