GOGEBIC COUNTY, MI-- The Michigan Department of Corrections is closing the Ojibway Correctional Facility in Gogebic County.
The facility has 203 employees and contains 1,162 minimum-security beds.
Department Spokesman Chris Gautz says a number of factors went into the decision to close Ojibway, including a falling prison population, historically low recidivism rate, and the isolation factor.
“It’s probably a 10- to 12-hour ride from the Metro Detroit area, where a lot of those individuals, where their families are from. It’s also two hours from the nearest facility, so if there were to ever be any sort of incident there it would take several hours for staff to come to their aid from another facility,” he says.
Gautz says this year the legislature cut the DOC’s budget in the amount of one prison closure.
Officials also attribute Ojibway’s shuttering to the state’s Offender Success model, which focuses on education and vocational training for prisoners, parolees and probationers.
Gautz says the DOC will work with employees to place them at other prisons around Michigan. Prisoners will be absorbed into other facilities with open beds.
Ojibway is expected to close its doors December 1.
