Corrections to tighten security at KJCC

The Department of Corrections plans to enhance security at Topeka's juvenile correctional facility by installing detection and surveillance equipment on the perimeter fence.

The department took control of the Kansas Juvenile Correctional Complex and the state's other juvenile facility in Larned this year when Gov. Sam Brownback merged the department with the Juvenile Justice Authority.

Mike Gaito, the department's capital improvements director, told the Joint Committee on State Building Construction on Wednesday that KJCC's perimeter security doesn’t meet the department's standards.

“They do not have a lot of perimeter surveillance and yard surveillance at Topeka juvenile," Gaito said. "Not to the level we’d typically see.”

Gaito and corrections spokesman Jeremy Barclay said KJCC has some perimeter surveillance now, but the department plans to add more. It also plans to add motion detectors to the perimeter fence.

"So when someone climbs it or cuts it, the sensors go off," Gaito said.

The department also plans to demolish a vacant building on the KJCC campus that was damaged by fire in May.

Rep. Steve Brunk, R-Wichita, asked Gaito about the $81,000 price tag attached to the razing of that building, which is outside the perimeter fence. Gaito said much of the cost is related to disposing of the building's asbestos.

Gaito said the department also plans to upgrade the door locks at the state's other juvenile facility in Larned.

The improvements in the juvenile system are more immediate, but Gaito also briefed the committee on long-term building projects on the adult side.

New projections of the state's female prison population show it leveling off, which Gaito said allows the department to take a proposed addition to the Topeka Correctional Facility off its to-do list.

Barclay said female inmates are showing lower rates of recidivism than their male counterparts.

“Our female population is more likely to succeed once they leave our program," Barclay said.

Projections show the male population continuing to grow, though, while the department is already operating at about 100 inmates over its capacity of 8,779.

Gaito told the committee that within the next five years the department plans to add two general population cell blocks at the El Dorado Correctional Facility that will hold 256 inmates each at a total building cost of $24 million. It also plans to add a single-bunk segregation unit for inmates with mental illness at El Dorado. The construction cost for that 128-bed unit is estimated at $13 million.

Shorter-term projects include replacing a generator at the Topeka Correctional Facility that was handed down from the Lansing Correctional Facility when it received a new one. At Lansing, the department plans to replace the decades-old motorized cell doors with more efficient rack-and-pinion models.

Gaito also said a number of renovations are planned for the Larned Correctional Mental Health Facility to "suicide-proof cells as much as we can."

“We have a high number of inmates at that facility that attempt to commit suicide because of mental illness,” Gaito said, adding, "We’ve had a number of them go to the hospital and have been close to suicide.”