University of Virginia Library

Officials Request Site Suggestions
For Proposed State Penitentiary

By MARGARET ALFORD

CD/Saxon Holt

Distant View Of Green Springs Penal Facility Site

One Of Four Planned $10 Million Prison Facilities

State penal officials have asked all
state county boards of supervisors if they
would be interested in having a $10
million prison facility built in their area.

W.K. Cunningham, director of the
State Division of Correction for the
State's Department of Welfare and
Institutions, said the facility will be built
as part of a long-range plan to phase out
the old Richmond state penitentiary.

Mr. Cunningham said he hopes that
the site's selection will not cause as much
controversy as the proposed Green Springs
institution in Louisa County.

The proposed new facility will be a
maximum security facility housing
long-term inmates. "There is no way to
sugar coat the pill" so that everyone in
the selected area will be happy, Mr.
Cunningham said.

A $454,500 1972 General Assembly
appropriation permitted the department
to proceed with plans and site acquisition
for the prison.

A site must be acquired in the near
future for plans to be developed in time
for the July 1973 completion date.

Mr. Cunningham said the department
has no specific property or area in mind
but is following guidelines requiring that
the institution be located near medical
facilities, schools, and churches for staff
personnel.

The institution would not have to be
in an urban area, he said, but it should be
close to a large population area where the
facility could draw staff members.

Twenty-five per cent of the prison's
staff would transfer from other
institutions, he said, while the other 75
per cent would be made up of local
recruits. The facility's annual payroll is
estimated at $1.5 million.

Mr. Cunningham said the institution
would occupy about 30 acres enclosed by
fences with the remaining acreage being
used as a buffer zone.

Mrs. Hiram Ely, Green Springs resident
and leader of current opposition to the
Green Springs penal facility proposal,
asserted that the newly announced
facility is not a replacement for the Green
Springs facility, but an additional prison,
among four to be built in the state.

In August 1970 Green Springs
residents sued the State Department of
Welfare and Institutions and the Law
Enforcement Assistance Administration
(LEAA) of the U.S. Justice Dept. Basis of
the state suit was that the state and
government had violated or intended to
violate the general interest of the public
with funding plans which would have
made construction of the facility
possible.

The construction, residents said,
would have destroyed the unique scenic
and historic value of the area.