A One-Of-A-Kind Prison -- New State Facility Is Just For Elderly, Disabled

THE POPULATION of the state's prisons is growing rapidly, and one way officials are trying to cope with the increased need for space is to move older and disabled inmates - who often are preyed upon by other inmates - into a facility of their own. The result is Ahtanum.

YAKIMA - The inmates milling around the yard of Washington's newest minimum-security prison are an eclectic group: senior citizens, sex offenders, young prisoners missing limbs and piloting wheelchairs, a murderer and sallow men weathered by illness.

They represent the first ripple of a Department of Corrections (DOC) experiment to create a site exclusively for aged and disabled offenders - traditionally the costliest and most ignored group in the system.

The Assisted Living Facility at the Ahtanum View Correctional Complex opened near this south central Washington city last month and houses only about a quarter of its eventual 120-inmate population, which will include 20 women. It is so new that the tailored programs it hopes to offer - jobs and placement counseling - aren't in place yet.

DOC officials say it is the only facility of its kind in the state, and they don't know of anything like it in the country.

In a regular prison, elderly and disabled prisoners are more frequent users of expensive infirmary beds. It's harder for them to compete for prison jobs. They don't qualify for transitional programs like work-release. Sometimes they are preyed upon by other convicts.

The goal at Ahtanum is to free beds in the higher-cost, higher-security prisons to accommodate the DOC's expanding inmate population while handling these low-risk and expensive offenders more efficiently. Ahtanum's staff will focus not only on the health issues but also on the challenges elderly and disabled inmates face when they get out.

How does a disabled ex-con compete for the already scarce jobs available to the physically-challenged work force? Where does an elderly sex offender with no family go?

"It is tough enough to be a convicted felon back on the streets when he doesn't have support," said Ahtanum Superintendent Joop DeJonge, "but it's that much tougher when he's a convicted felon back on the streets with no support and 60 years old or in a wheelchair."

Ahtanum is not only an experiment, but an acknowledgment by DOC that it needs to be creative as its population continues to gray and swell with longer prison sentences.

The average age of a state inmate a few years ago was 27. Now it's 34. Twenty inmates are older than 76.

Although inmates older than 50 make up only about 7 percent of the state prison population, they accounted for almost 16 percent of the inmate population requiring outside medical care in fiscal year 1996. The DOC spent twice as much on outside care per offender over 50 than it did on outside care per regular prisoner in that period.

"Across the nation, we're seeing an older population of inmates, and the medical costs are skyrocketing," said Gary Clark, corrections-program manager. "This is going to have to be addressed."

The squeeze figures to grow tighter. More than half of the 286 Washington inmates sentenced to life without parole have entered the system in the past 3 1/2 years, thanks mainly to "three strikes, you're out," the state's get-tough punishment for repeat criminals.

But Ahtanum only accepts offenders due to be released within 4 1/2 years. In addition, they must be either 55 or older, or have a physical disability or illness, and they cannot be considered security threats or gravely sick. About 500 prisoners among DOC's 12,000-inmate population meet the criteria.

The complex is housed in a former hospital the DOC acquired a few years ago that sits next to one of its work-release centers. It was renovated for $6.5 million and has a staff of about 65.

Guards at Ahtanum don't wear standard uniforms and are encouraged to talk to inmates. One of the questions guards had to answer before getting hired was, "How would you feel if an offender asked for help tying his shoe?"

At 84, Adolph Elde is Washington's second-oldest prison inmate and is nearing the end of a 5 1/2-year sentence. He spends most of his days reading a Bible with enlarged type. A large, handwritten sign hangs above his bed and reads, "Remember Your Pills." He is diabetic and takes medication to ease his back pain.

He says all he wants to do, when he is released next year, is go home to his 84-year-old wife and his carpentry projects.

Most prison programs emphasize getting a high-school equivalency degree and alcohol and drug counseling. Elde doesn't need either.

"This place has already given me a little hope," he said. "You can hold your head up here. They seem to want to help you. At Walla Walla, it was about obeying the guards and staying out of the way."

Elde, convicted of a sex offense, said he spent the past six months in an infirmary bed at the penitentiary in Walla Walla. Here, he cleans tables after breakfast and lunch, a temporary job he got because the first man who had it suffered a stroke.

DeJonge said that when the program is running full speed, Elde and others will be pushed to do as much as they can and accept more responsibility.

"We're looking for any hint of motivation here," said DeJonge. "If an offender isn't interested, I'll send him or her back (to regular prison). I listen for a guy who says, `I'm concerned about what I'll do when I get out.' We can work with that."

Two local businesses, a bicycle manufacturer and a temporary-services company, will provide jobs. Some inmates will work a couple of hours a day, at most. Yakima Community College will help set up career classes.

A group of emergency-room doctors from the area has agreed to provide care in Ahtanum's clinic.

Travis Sparr is a 25-year-old Shelton-area man, a former gang member with a long history of crimes, including assaults. He lost both legs after getting drunk and trying to hop a freight train. He is anxious to get out and afraid of it. Getting out, he and friends say, can be harder than being inside where you get three meals and free rent.

There is a thick band of scarring across Sparr's left wrist where, he said, he used a hot knife to burn off his gang tattoo. Sparr has taken the anger-management and chemical-dependency classes. He has an education, a wife and a possible job once he's released. Also awaiting him is the $60,000 restitution bill he owes his victims.

When Sparr is released, the wheelchairs stay. They belong to the DOC. Ahtanum caseworkers will try to help him find one he can use or buy on the outside and will work with community groups and state and federal agencies to help him find leads on housing and benefits.

DeJonge designed the program after the DOC decided it needed to try something new with senior and disabled prisoners. A 22-year corrections veteran, DeJonge sets incremental goals. Getting a car thief to settle on stealing hubcaps is success.

"We're trying something outside the normal box. We're trying to teach some life skills and ease their transition so they can stay out of here and not be a burden on taxpayers. Will it work? I don't know. I hope so.

"We can't keep doing the same old thing," he said, "and expect new results."