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Aug 2, 7:25 PM EDT

Lawmakers weigh blueprint for closing training school

By NOREEN GILLESPIE
Associated Press Writer

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) -- Cost emerged as a major concern Tuesday as state lawmakers considered Gov. M. Jodi Rell's plan to close the embattled Connecticut Juvenile Training School.

Tuesday's special legislative hearing followed the release of a report this week by the Department of Children and Families recommending that the Middletown detention center for troubled boys be closed because of numerous problems.

The plan calls for shutting down the 4-year-old facility, which cost $57 million to build, by 2008 and replacing it with three smaller, community-based centers.

DCF Commissioner Darlene Dunbar and Juvenile Services Director Don DeVore painted a picture of a facility that was too prison-like, too institutional and too big for the 92 boys who live there. While improvements have been made in programming and reducing violence, there's a limit to what can be done, DeVore said.

"Physical environment does say a lot about how we think about these kids, and how we care about them," DeVore said.

But the closure plan may face some opposition in the legislature, where the first of several concerns was voiced Tuesday during the joint hearing before the budget-writing, judiciary and children's committees.

Rep. Denise Merrill, D-Mansfield, said reports have shown that the problems at the facility were with staffing levels, poor suicide watches and education programs, among other things. She questioned whether constructing new buildings would eradicate programming issues.

"I'm having trouble making that leap, frankly," said Merrill, the co-chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee. "This is an enormous amount of money for the state to spend, again."

DCF hasn't come up with firm numbers on what it will cost to create the new facilities - two 45-bed homes for boys and one 12-bed center for girls. Early estimates show building new boys facilities would cost $33.9 million, while renovating existing facilities would cost $23.2 million. The annual cost of running the boys' centers, along with other proposed services, would be $27.9 million.

Before adding the cost of girls' programs, that is slightly less than the $32.9 million the state spent on CJTS in 2005. Rell's budget office estimates it will cost $240,686 a year to house a boy at one of the smaller centers, compared to $365,845 at CJTS.

Rep. Marie Kirkley-Bey, D-Hartford, was upset with the plan. She questioned why it would be good idea to send boys back to where they got in trouble in the first place for rehabilitation. She asked why DCF was turning to community-based services now, when they have been around for years.

"Either you have not tapped into them ... or now you've just come into the realization this is what you need to do," she said.

Kirkley-Bey added, "You have been a drain and a bloodsucker on the budget, and I'm calling it the way I see it."

DCF officials say the new plan will provide better ways to work with families and address children's issues, such as mental health, substance abuse and education. But Kirkley-Bey also said it wasn't fair to put all the centers in inner cities, inundating them but not the suburbs with troubled youth.

Finding communities willing to take the homes likely be a problem as the plan moves forward, said Rep. Robert Farr, R-West Hartford, citing difficulty getting detention facilities built elsewhere.

"If Hartford's not going to take one of these places, who's going to take them? Bridgeport? We can't get a juvenile facility built in Bridgeport and we've been looking at it for over a decade," he said.

While some lawmakers considered a special session to handle the training school issue, one is not scheduled, said Rep. Michael Lawlor, D-East Hartford, co-chairman of the Judiciary Committee. Lawmakers will likely wait and watch until DCF delivers a final blueprint for the proposal 12 to 18 months from now.

Lawmakers say they want to tread carefully. The original contract for the training school was fast-tracked through the legislature and became a focus of a corruption probe into former Gov. John G. Rowland's administration. Rowland is now serving a year-and-a-day federal sentence.

Though it will be expensive, keeping CJTS open will likely cost more in the long-run, Lawlor said.

"I think it's probably fair to say the do-nothing option is probably far more expensive."

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