New Center for Low-level Offenders
A new facility for criminals was unveiled Monday in Luzerne County. County leaders said the new day reporting center will help ease jail overcrowding.
It is run by a company called BI Incorporated.
Soon, up to 150 clients will be able to get treatment and training programs at the Wilkes-Barre facility. The clients are nonviolent criminals who are referred by either court, jail or probation officials.
"When they first start they check in six days a week, they have to report six days a week and then once they go through the successful program the number of days reduces," explained Matt Wirtner of BI Incorporated.
The day center is Luzerne County's solution for jail overcrowding.
Right now, there are about 750 inmates at the county correctional facility and no money to build a new one.
"If we can reduce the enrollment in the prison, that will certainly help us limp along until we have the means to build a new prison," said Luzerne County Commissioner Chairwoman Maryanne Petrilla.
County officials said they are not sure how much the day reporting center will save the county.
They hope to have a better idea in about a year, but for now they're happy to have this solution to keep some people out of cells.
"For example, I have a 92-year-old inmate who served three days because he took the coupons out of the newspaper from a convenient mart next door to the hotel he was living in. It cost me $90 a day to incarcerate that guy plus all the time and staff for something that could have been taken care of a lot more smoothly," said jail warden Joseph Piazza.
Prison officials insist the day reporting center is not about being soft on crime. They said it is not about helping low-level criminals change their lives and stop getting in trouble.
The center in Luzerne County is the second of its kind in Pennsylvania.
The other is in Franklin County.
By Sarah Buynovsky, WNEP
