Governor Newsom’s decision to keep the California Rehabilitation Center (CRC) closed is justified. The facility is deemed unsafe and outdated, requiring over $1.1 billion in repairs, as estimated. Furthermore, it has a history of violating the Americans with Disabilities Act, and suffers from extreme heat, as documented. The city of Norco supports the closure and plans to redevelop the site.
Arguments suggesting that Assembly Bill 109’s realignment is overloading jails are refuted by data from the Sheriff’s Department; only about 7% of Los Angeles jail inmates serve sentences under this law. The primary issues are pretrial detention ( over half of the jail population) and the lack of sufficient mental health treatment beds, leading to the unconstitutional conditions highlighted in Attorney General Bonta’s lawsuit.
Reopening closed prisons is not a solution. It ignores the community efforts that led to the closures and fails to address the underlying problems of pretrial detention and inadequate mental health care. Focusing on these core issues, rather than resorting to outdated facilities like the CRC (“Corrections officers at Norco prison make plea to state to keep it open,”), is crucial for genuine reform.
