Nearly two years after closing the State Correctional Institution Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's Department of Corrections is planning to reopen the 125-year-old prison in Woods Run to house growing numbers of inmates.

	Rebecca Droke, Post-Gazette Western Pen has been empty and quiet for two years, but plans are to change that. Click photo for larger image.

Corrections officials said at least two units of the prison, long known as Western Penitentiary, will reopen by July 1 to house 750 inmates who are taxing or exceeding capacity at other state prisons. Two additional units, which also would hold 750 inmates, could be opened later if the inmate population continues to increase.

Corrections Secretary Jeffrey A. Beard said the former maximum security prison will be used for three to five years. It now will be a minimum and lower-medium security facility and will provide drug and alcohol treatment to inmates, particularly those who will return to Western Pennsylvania after their release, he said.

Built along the banks of the Ohio River, Western Penitentiary had been repeatedly targeted for closure for decades before its last bus load of inmates was transferred Jan. 13, 2005, to a new prison in Forest County. The walled complex, which periodically flooded, had become the state's most expensive prison per inmate to run.

Still, its closure drew protests from public officials and corrections officers who criticized the loss of local jobs and the costs of shifting and transporting prisoners to newer facilities in outlying counties.

In a statement yesterday, Mr. Beard said reopening Western Pen will cost $33 million. He said employees with seniority will be given first preference to return or work there to ensure that an experienced staff opens and operates the prison. About 800 people worked there before it closed.

Corrections officials did not respond to requests for additional comment.

Officials with the Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association, which represents about 8,000 corrections officers and 2,000 other prison workers, said they were glad state officials were addressing dangerous overcrowding in prisons that currently are operating at 113 percent of inmate capacity.

The state's inmate population has grown by more than 7,000 people in the past six years, association President Donald G. McNany said, and is on track to exceed 44,000 for the first time. Some prisons are so packed that inmates are housed in former day rooms or recreation areas without restroom facilities, Mr. McNany said.

"Just putting more people in to use the same yard or dining hall taxes everything. Little [irritations] to someone who is incarcerated can go bad in a split second," he said.

Mr. McNany said he remains puzzled as to why the state closed Western Pen in the first place, forcing its employees to transfer, retire or find other jobs. He said union and public officials predicted years ago that the state's inmate population would keep growing.

Mr. McNany urged the Department of Corrections to hire and train more officers to offset staffing needs at Western Pen, saying it already has more than 200 vacant slots at other prisons.

Mr. Beard said the department will do so and that vacancies created at other prisons by transfers to Western Pen will be filled.

City and Allegheny County Council members who represent the North Side did not return calls yesterday.

State Rep. Don Walko, D-North Side, who fought the prison's closing, said he is pleased that reopening it will bring jobs back to the city but has questions about its new use as a lower-security facility that will provide drug and alcohol treatment.

Mr. Walko said he learned about plans to reopen Western Pen from reporters and received little information when he contacted the corrections department. Noting that community groups had sued to block a halfway house from operating in the prison administration building, he said he was angry that he wasn't notified or consulted before the plan was announced.

"There could be community concerns," he said, adding that escapes and other problems were "relatively rare" at the former maximum security prison and that it had little day-to-day impact on neighborhoods around it.

"I'm going to have to get to the bottom of this," he said, "and consult with the community groups."