Site No. 1 of three for the proposed building of a new Blair County Prison is in Allegheny Township near the Hollidaysburg Veterans Home. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

HOLLIDAYSBURG — An engineering firm has identified a preferred site in Allegheny Township where a new Blair County Prison could be built, on ground behind the former Calvin House restaurant, between Alto-Reste cemetery and the Hollidaysburg Veterans Home.

The study also identified two additional sites for what is proposed to be a 440-bed, 165,950 square-foot facility, with a construction cost ranging from a low of $96.27 million to a high of $123.16 million.

TranSystems Vice President Brian Endler stressed Thursday, in a presentation of a study during a county commissioners’ meeting, that the price range was offered as a “safe estimate” at this stage, so county leaders have an idea as to the cost.

“This is just our opinion and it’s based on our experience,” Endler said. “We really don’t know until we get the bids in.”

He also said the range doesn’t account for related project costs that would add about 15% to 25% to the bill.

“It’s never an inexpensive endeavor (to build a prison),” Endler said. “It’s not just studs and drywall. There’s a lot of concrete block and rebar. These (facilities) have to be safe and secure.”

Commissioners Chairman Dave Kessling and Amy Webster said Thursday that they were glad to see the proposed prison project reach this point and both spoke of their intentions to keep moving forward.

Commissioner Laura Burke, who was unable to attend Thursday’s presentation, issued a statement in support of the proposed project.

“While there will be a high monetary cost to this project, we will be better off as a county in the long run when we have a modern correctional facility that meets our needs,” Burke said.

Kessling also spoke Thursday in favor of acquiring the two parcels associated with the study’s preferred site of 75 acres, using money that’s budgeted and designated for that purpose. Webster also showed interest in pursuing that purchase after a year of reviewing more than a dozen sites, including many deemed unsuitable because of their distance from the courthouse or because they contained prime farmland, which the county has a history of trying to preserve.

She said they also showed little interest in proposed sites that would disrupt a neighborhood.

Webster described the three sites in the study as “remote enough.”

TranSystems Senior Project Manager Greg Schrock described the preferred Allegheny Township site as undeveloped, with a moderate slope, access to utilities except for water and room for expansion.

The study identified a nearby potential site, also in Allegheny Township, consisting of 45 acres behind the Outback Steakhouse restaurant, with access that would need to be created from Sheraton Drive.

Building on that site, Schrock said, would require addressing what’s now a severely sloping hillside, a steep access road leading into the site and the need to create a secondary access route as the township requires.

In addition, there’s limited room for expansion, he said.

The study’s third site was in Blair Township, on the western side of Route 36 in the Chimney Rocks area. That site, at 75 acres, consists of a severely sloping hillside with no current access. Building there, Schrock said, would require the most site preparation work and a long entrance road.

While the Blair Township site was recognized as the closest to the courthouse — a factor involved with transporting inmates for court hearings — Kessling offered no interest in that location.

“I don’t want to spend millions of dollars to push dirt around so we can build a prison,” Kessling said. “To me, that’s a waste of money.”

Webster pointed out that if the county doesn’t have to spend money on moving dirt, that could help keep the project’s cost on the lower side.

When starting his presentation on the study, Endler spoke against renovating or expanding the current prison on Mulberry Street and called it undersized, inadequate and inefficient.

While the original portion was built 156 years ago in 1869, its largest addition was built in 1983 and renovations were tackled in 1990 and 2004.

“Even if you’d expand or add on, you’d still be stuck with the 1869 portion, which you really can’t renovate very well,” Endler said. “So in our opinion, it would be considered kind of a Band-Aid to renovate or expand the current facility.”

Among the benefits of building a new prison, he included designing the facility in a way that reduces personnel costs and creates areas for inmate programs and services, including mental health treatment.

He said construction of a single-story facility, with a mezzanine, will require fewer corrections officers than required at the current facility, which he described as a maze.

Kessling, who used to work for the state Department of Corrections, said he’s familiar with single-story facilities where one corrections officer monitors 125 inmates.

He also spoke of his interest in offering more opportunities for inmate programs and services, including mental health treatment.

“If we want to rehabilitate people and put them back in our community, then those are things we have to provide (to the inmates) … And if we don’t, then I think we’re doing them an injustice,” Kessling said.

Burke also spoke of the need for more space and better use of space than can be provided inside the current prison.

“We need to be able to appropriately house different classifications of inmates, provide a wider range of health services and accommodate increased needs for rehabilitation programming within a secure, safe building,” Burke said.

As for a timeline, Kessling referenced the study indicating that the project would span at least three years and said it should be given priority because of the condition of the current facility.

“If it was up to me, I’d have it built today,” the commissioner said.

Kessling and Webster also said Thursday that they have no intention of backing away from the project in light of the projected costs.

Webster spoke of financing the project with a bond issue that sets up payments over several years.

Kessling said the project, in his opinion, is one that has been neglected for years.

“There’s no board of commissioners who wants to build a prison because it’s a death sentence for reelection,” he said. “It is going to be extremely costly, but I’m proud of this board for taking it on. It needs to be done, not only for the county but for the future of the county.”

Mirror Staff Writer Kay Stephens is at 814-946-7456.