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I was there a few hours after the Osawatomie Correctional Facility (OCF) inmates had been removed and taken to the Lansing Correctional Facility.  It's been a hard-fought battle for Osawatomie, and the three politicians (House Reps. Bill Feuerborn, Jene Vickrey, and Senator Pat Apple).  After all, the inmates at this minimum-security location did a lot of work locally for the Cities of Osawatomie, Paola, and Hillsdale Lake, not to forget the Osawatomie State Hospital itself.   Hospital Superintendent Greg Valentine said it would take 8.5 new hired positions at the hospital to make up for this missing workforce. 

In my Osawatomie wanderings, I was finally allowed to visit the OCF sight.  Many of you, who read my columns and blog, know I love to explore Osawatomie and offer my reactions and insight. Ever since taking on this job, I've been anticipating a state hospital visit, specifically the OCF.  But not until Friday, once the inmates were gone, was I allowed to move around on sight, although not allowed to go inside the building itself. 

What I found on what to me appeared to be a campus setting, more akin to a college, than a prison.  As Bill Sinclair, director of safety and environment, drove up to the unit, I noted an old tennis court covered by weight lifting machines and barbells of so many different weights.  Next to this location sat an empty dog pen, used by Safe Harbor, the dog training program that originated at the Lansing facility.  A lone sign, No Unattended Dogs, hung on the open gate. 

I, then, walked over to a patio sitting across the road from the facilities portico.  It was covered with nice benches and picnic tables for family visits.  Or for inmates to relax outdoors on a nice day.  This is when I noted no bars on the windows.  Maybe there were some, but hidden. 

No bars reminded me of the Bon Air Correctional School for Girls my mother taught business courses at for 27 years outside of Richmond, Virginia, where I grew up.  In those days, "her school" was built on an open campus concept with buildings very similar to the old ones on the Osawatomie State Hospital grounds.  It wasn't until she had retired in the mid 1980s that the campus was fenced in with tall fences and razor wire.  A different kind of teenager than the ones my mother taught in the 1950s-1970s had begun being sent to Bon Air.  This is also why she retired when she did. 

I didn't see anything threatening at his minimum-security location, other than a well-maintained facility because the prisoners did the maintaining.   As I stood talking to Sinclair, Bill Russell - chief security officer for the hospital grounds, and another gentleman, Jim Fisher, we all agreed it was a sad day.   That seems an odd thing for guys to say about being rid of prison inmates.  But as Fisher said, "They maintained the facility well and were hard workers."  

And Russell said he was irritated at how the legislators surprised the hospital by both the closing and then speeding up the closing.  Sinclair and the other guys agreed with Bill Feuerborn's hope that the facility can be mothballed.  For now, all Russell and his security crew can simply secure the sight.  They really don't know anything else right now. 

Each man has been on the hospital grounds since their school days in the 1960s or 1970s.  They agreed the OCF was a good thing and hated seeing a good thing close.  I agree.

The prisoners have been taken from an ideal (at least for a sort of prison) to an actual prison facility in Lansing.  Although the Lansing Prison is made of beautiful stone (is it limestone and sandstone), it is still just that:  a prison. 

If we are talking inmate reform, where's the better location to perform that function?  Behind prison bars and walls or on a beautiful campus without bars or fences (except for the dogs)?

But, it always has to come down to money. 

I will be back to the state hospital grounds.  I was taken by the grounds and the history of the facility.  Yes, Osawatomie, you have a treasure on the hill.

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