King says prison bond would save money in long run

BUCKS HARBOR – Gov. Angus King was in Bucks Harbor on Wednesday to show his support for the $25 million bond issue for prisons, but it was clear that the trip Down East was half the fun for the outgoing governor.

“I called John Melrose [commissioner of the Department of Transportation] on my way here,” the governor told a small group of about a dozen corrections workers, “and told him that if we’d done nothing else right in eight years, we’d built a nice road.”

King sat on the corner of a metal desk in a small inmate visitation area of the Downeast Correctional Facility here to assure corrections workers that he was in full support of the bond issue that would build a new, more efficient facility in Machias.

While there is no organized opposition to the bond issue, which is one of two on the November ballot, officials are afraid that concern over the state’s economy and general apathy may hinder voter support.

King made it clear Wednesday that Maine taxpayers were going to have to pay the piper, some now or more later.

“A new facility will reduce our per-capita costs from $130 a day to $85 a day,” King said. “That’s a huge savings. … What is often lost in the talks about corrections is that 90 percent of these inmates are eventually going to get out. That means that what we do within these facilities is important from a public safety standpoint.”

The Downeast Correctional Facility, which houses a mix of medium- and minimum-security inmates, is regulated for 96 inmates; on Wednesday there were 148 inmates in residence. Cells or rooms designed to bunk two instead bunk three or four, officials said.

Sewer systems are inefficient, water quality is questionable, and cost of upkeep is unmanageable, Commissioner Martin Magnusson said Wednesday.

“It’s like putting a new transmission into a ’67 Chevy. At some point it makes sense to buy a new car,” King said.

The town of Machias has donated land in the town’s industrial park to hold the proposed new facility if voters approve the bond issue. If the $25 million bond issue is approved by voters, $13.9 million will be used to build a new, more efficient facility Down East and $11.1 million will be used to for improvements to the Maine Correctional Center in Windham.

King is advocating passage of the bond, saying that interest rates and construction costs are low and that “one way or another this is going to have be done.”

“It’s going to ultimately save the taxpayers money to do this now. Interest rates are low, and when the economy is on the downturn it’s not a bad time for the government to do things to help sustain the economy, such as construction project like this,” he said.

“It will be tragic for the taxpayer if we don’t pass this,” he said. “It’s going to cost them a great deal more if they don’t.”