Nevada Department of Corrections Director Howard Skolnik is seen in this Oct. 2007 file photo from the execution chamber at the Nevada State Prison. During a budget hearing Thursday, April 23, 2009, Skolnik told state lawmakers that the existing execution chamber is "almost medieval." (AP Photo/Nevada Appeal, Cathleen Allison)
Lawmakers reviewed a new prison construction plan Thursday " but were told the governor still plans to shut down the old Nevada State Prison on Fifth Street.
Director Howard Skolnik said the new plan would immediately begin work to expand Warm Springs as the eventual replacement for neighboring NSP.
While lawmakers have said they oppose shuttering the 100-year-old prison, they haven't made a decision on that plan. Skolnik said closing NSP would save his operating budget $18 million a year.
"That's a decision that needs to be made," he said after the hearing of the Senate Finance/Assembly Ways and Means joint subcommittee.
If lawmakers decide to keep NSP open, he said, cuts will have to be made somewhere else or more money put into his budgets.
NSP employees have objected to shutting the old prison, saying that would put about 175 people out of work, further damaging Carson City's economy. Lawmakers have questioned the logic of closing a prison when the state needs more beds to hold the growing inmate population.
The plan includes $9.6 million to plan and design a major expansion of Warm Springs prison. Skolnik has said in the past that expansion would restore most of the jobs lost by closing NSP.
The plan would construct three modern housing units and core facilities such as a larger kitchen. Housing up to 1,500 inmates, it would be built by 2013, in the meantime providing construction jobs in the Capital.
In addition, a new execution chamber, which Skolnik said is needed because it's unlikely the historic gas chamber in Carson City would meet the latest court requirements, would be built in Southern Nevada.
Together, those two projects would cost $62.2 million.
Skolnik said the plan laid out for the committee Thursday "will meet almost any scenario we've been asked to prepare."
The committee took no action on the proposals.
Contact reporter Geoff Dornan at gdornan@nevadaappeal.com or 687-8750.
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