Construction kicks off for East County Detention Center

Today city officials and residents celebrated the ground breaking for the new $330 million county detention center.

The East Valley Detention Center will be built on a six-acre site and add 1,273 beds to the overall detention center bed capacity of the county.

The old detention center was built in the mid-1950’s and is not designed to hold criminal offenders for prolonged periods of time, whereas this new facility is capable of much more.

“It will enhance public safety, improve economic development. It is going to be a big day for the eastern Coachella valley,” said Supervisor John J. Benoit.

One of the main goals of the new detention center is to provide programs to reduce the amount of returning offenders.

“Every jail system in California was impacted by AB 109 realignment when it took place. It took effect in 2011 and that changed kind of the way jails operate. Now one of the key areas is that every jail is committed to is having programs, not only counseling, life skills, and those sort of things,” said Sheriff Stan Sniff.

Many of these programs include; residential substance abuse treatment, high school diplomas, career technical education, and much more to help the inmates return to civilian life.

This facility will also be helping the community by generating 450 permanent staff positions.

“We really want to encourage everyone that lives here in the community that is looking for a great job in law enforcement, whether it’s a deputy sheriff or civilian employees to apply because we have lots of that will be opening up here,” said Sheriff Stan Sniff.

The center will also designed to be eco-friendly. The designers are aiming for the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design silver level rating for energy-saving and other design features.

The East County Detention Center will be built at the southwest corner of Oasis Street and Highway 111.

If you commute on Highway 111, expect some traffic delays.

“They wont see anything different than they’ve seen for the last 18 months with the building of the law administrator building that the county of Riverside just completed just east of here,” said Mayor of Indio Lupe Ramos Watson.

The total project is estimated to take 30 months and be complete by December 2017.