Lake County Awarded $20 Million in State Funding

LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The state of California awarded $20 million in construction funding to Lake County for upgrades to the Hill Road Correctional Facility.

The improvements are necessary due to the local impact of Assembly Bill (AB) 109 (or the Public Safety Realignment Act), which sentences offenders to county jails instead of state prisons. The local impact of AB 109 on the Hill Road Correctional Facility has caused a significant strain on the average daily population at the jail, with convicted and sentenced offenders making up almost 30 percent of the jail’s monthly bookings.

The funding will be used to build a new type II, 40-bed women’s jail with a new standalone 39-bed medical/mental health services building with program space, a new administration building and renovations so that existing space can accommodate rehabilitative programs, according to Lake County News. The improvements will help the jail meet the standards of California’s new public safety realignment goals.

The $20 million comes from the $500 million issued as part of Senate Bill (SB) 1022, which provided for the issuance of lease revenue bonds to help finance jail modifications to deal with the influx of nonserious, nonviolent and non-sex offenders. Thirty-six counties applied for the funding, and the Board of State and Community Corrections announced on Jan. 16 that it was awarding to 15 of those counties.

For those counties that will receive SB 1022 funding, they are required to provide a 10 percent local match, although Lake County received authorization for a reduction to a 5 percent match due to its status as a “small county.” This match includes cash and in-kind contributions such as existing land value. The Lake County Board of Supervisors has appropriated $650,000 of local matching funds towards the project from the Rural and Small Counties Sheriff’s Fund.

Other counties receiving Board of State and Community Corrections awards in this round of funding included Napa County, $13,474,000; Tuolumne County, $20 million; Kings County, $20 million; Shasta County, $20 million; Tehama County, $6.5 million; Santa Cruz County, $24,635,000; Santa Barbara County, $38,976,000; Solano County, $23 million; Tulare County, $40 million; San Joaquin County, $33.3 million; San Mateo County, $24,374,000; Fresno County, $79,194,000; Orange County, $80 million; Sacramento County, $56.4 million.