CHARLESTON, Maine — After learning last week that the state is changing the Mountain View Youth Development Center into an adult corrections facility, local officials are investigating whether the switch is allowed under prior agreements between the Department of Corrections and the town, according to a statement released Monday by selectmen.
“MVYDC has been an efficient operating center for a number of years, which leads the town to believe that there is more to this than meets the eye,” states the press release, which Selectman Keith Scott said he approved along with board members Richard Goodwin and Chairwoman Terri Hall. “We are currently researching paperwork in our archives from 1978 forward that involves the town and [Department of Corrections] agreements of intent and use of these facilities in Charleston.”
A message sent Monday to Deputy Corrections Commissioner Jody Breton seeking information about any agreements between the DOC and the town was not immediately returned.
The youth facility in the town of 1,400 residents shares resources and a campus with the medium-security Charleston Correctional Facility, which opened in 1980 and sits on the former Charleston Air Force Radar Station. Mountain View was established in 2002 to handle incarcerated youth from eastern and northern Maine, and two weeks ago sent the last remaining nine juvenile offenders to the Long Creek Youth Development Center in South Portland as part of the change.
Approximately 35 people will lose their jobs as a result of the facility’s change in mission, dropping the number of employees from 146 to 111. Mountain View Superintendent Jeff Morin said Friday that the department is doing all it can to minimize the impacts on employees by offering transfers to other facilities and opportunities to be hired at the newly formed adult program. Others may opt to retire.
“It will affect the local economy as well as many families in our community,” the letter from Charleston Selectmen states. “The reports have been very conflicting that have been provided.”
A Rapid Response Team organized by the Maine Department of Labor will be at the facility this week to answer employee questions about health care coverage, insurance, unemployment, retirement and other subjects, officials said.
The change makes better use of the 133-bed facility, which averaged 27 juvenile inmates daily in 2015, a major drop from the average of 71 in 2009, according to data provided by Breton.
In addition to the decrease in youths at the facility, the curtailment also came about because the department needs a facility to house inmates who need complex medical care, she said, describing it as “enhanced treatment.”
In preparation for the facility’s mission change, last April Mountain View expanded its programming and services by adding a Young Adult Male Offenders program, for those aged 18 to 25, who “could greatly benefit from the continued educational, therapeutic and substance abuse services that facility staff were already providing to juveniles,” the facility’s website states.
The Department of Corrections also is planning to transfer inmates who have disabilities, are sex offenders or who have other service needs to Mountain View, Breton said.
“As further information develops the media will be updated,” the Charleston Selectmen’s statement says.
Messages left Monday for Chairwoman Hall, who is the town’s liaison with the prison, were not immediately returned. Goodwin was out of town until late Monday and Scott said he just joined the board in the spring and referred all questions to Hall about “what happened in the past.”
Watch bangordailynews.com for updates.