Marin Independent Journal
MARIN COUNTY, Calif. — A STARTLING rendering of the $346 million death row complex the state appears determined to build at San Quentin State Prison makes it clear that it will be a new Marin landmark.
It also will by a symbol of state lawmakers’ stubborn and misguided refusal to take a hard look at a construction project that gets more costly each year. The hulking four-story structure on the west side of San Quentin also promises to show how little respect the state has for the shoreline-development standards California imposes on anyone else who wants to build on the bay.
There is no question that larger and more modern facilities are needed to house the state’s growing number of condemned inmates.
The question is where to build a new death row and how much it should cost.
Marin’s two legislators, Assemblyman Jared Huffman and state Sen. Mark Leno, contend that there have to be less costly options. They have tried in vain to get money approved for its construction taken out of the state budget. Given the deep cuts that will be needed to address the state’s $42 billion budget deficit, spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a new death row at San Quentin doesn’t make sense.
They say there’s a better public use for that prime property - a new ferry port that would significantly reduce the time it takes to commute to San Francisco.
Huffman says the state should consider housing death row inmates at several state prisons rather than holding almost all of them at San Quentin.
The cost of the new death row - now estimated at more than $450,000 per cell - is reason enough to take a serious look at possible options.
Even state Sen. Jeff Denham, a law-and-order Republican from Merced, has slapped the “Cadillac” label on the death row project.
Huffman says he’s not trying to close San Quentin or move the death chamber to another prison. He questions the wisdom of spending so much money on a bayfront behemoth when less-costly alternatives have yet to be explored.
Huffman and Leno aren’t trying to be obstructionists. They are working hard to come up with a constructive alternative that improves safety for correctional officers and inmates without costing taxpayers $346 million.
Copyright 2009 Marin Independent Journal, a MediaNews Group publication