SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — Back in 1984, state lawmakers knew there were problems in the state prison in Sioux Falls.
On May 31, 1984, District Court Judge Donald Porter ruled that prison conditions at the
state penitentiary in Sioux Falls violated the Eighth Amendment and the 14th Amendment to the
United States Constitution prohibits cruel and unusual punishment.
The ruling came as then Gov. Bill Janklow was developing a plan to convert a closed university campus in Springfield to a minimum security prison to ease overcrowding in Sioux Falls. The solution to problems in Sioux Falls was to convert a former university in Springfield to a minimum security prison.
Roughly 40 years later, the South Dakota Legislature will consider a new men’s prison to replace the more than 100-year-old facility in Sioux Falls. The Legislature is expected to vote on a $650 million prison package on Tuesday.
KELOLAND News will be streaming live coverage of Tuesday’s special session on KELOLAND+ and KELOLAND.com starting at 9 a.m.
The state’s examination of its prison system over decades has focused on small projects and policy changes or discussion that have avoided replacing the state prison built in 1881 in Sioux Falls.
An article called “Closing Time” published in the fall of 2009 by the South Dakota State Historical Press said, Janklow told lawmakers in 1984 that the Springfield option was less expensive than a Sioux Falls option.
“Legislative approval of the Springfield option would spare taxpayers substantial costs associated with major, court-mandated improvements to the state’s aged, crowded prison. Specifically, the state could avoid the estimated $3-million price tag of a new minimum-security prison in Sioux Falls. “’If we don’t do Springfield,” the governor said, “we must add a building at Sioux Falls whether we like it or not,” Closing Time quoted from a media report.
The prison in Springfield, called Mike Durfee, opened in December 1984 with female inmates. Male inmates arrived in January 1985. Female offenders move a facility in Pierre in 1997. The facility was named Mike Durfee in 1999. The South Dakota Department of Corrections calls it a Level III with most inmates at medium security.
1990 DOC report, 1993 Jameson Annex
Janklow’s plan apparently only solved some problems for few years as a 1990 DOC Commission report cited overcrowding, changes in the type of sentenced offenders and their program needs, rising crime rates, and public fear of crime as well as an increasing prison population, according to a summary published by the U.S. Department of Justice.
The DOC Commission’s report made several recommendations to “improve South Dakota’s correctional system focus on data collection, parole and probation, education and training, facilities, prison industries, community alternatives, and prison capacity.”
The state did address some prison needs when the Jameson Annex opened on the Sioux Falls campus in 1993. Jameson housed 512 high-level medium and maximum security inmates in 2022.
A minimum security facility was built on the Sioux Falls campus in 1993 for a cost of about $1.5 million. It housed 92 inmates in 2022. Unit D was added in 2006 and health services was expanded in 2021.
And the prison population continued to grow after 1990.
1995 North Dakota compared to South Dakota
A 1995 memorandum from the state’s Legislative Research Council (LRC) compared North Dakota’s prison population to South Dakota’s.
The memo referred to discussions about the state’s prison system over the past several years and how it compared to North Dakota.
At the time, South Dakota had just over 1,800 adult inmates while North Dakota’s inmate population was just over 600.
The memo said South Dakota has inmates on longer sentences which was “most likely the
result of large maximum penalties which are authorized” by state law. “These longer sentences probably help explain the size of the prison population,” the memo said.
500% population growth from 1977 to 2011
A South Dakota sentencing and corrections reform report under then Gov. Dennis Daugaard cited the 500% growth in the prison poopulation from 1977 to 2011.
Daugaard established a South Dakota Criminal Justice Initiative Work Group that started with then-state Chief Justice David Gilbertson gathering state input from March until June 2012.
The work group’s final report in 2012 said its policy recommendations are estimated to save between $197 and $212 in averted prison construction and operating expenses through 2022. “By avoiding the expansion of between 596 and 755 prison beds, state taxpayers will avert the entire cost of construction and between 72 and 87 percent of the operating cost s over the next 10 years,” the report said.
The work group recommended focusing prisons for inmate with violent crimes. The report said about one in three South Dakota prisoners is incarcerated for a drug or alcohol offense, which are typically non-violent offenses.
The 2012 study and recommendations resulted in Senate Bill 70 called the Public Safety
Improvement Act. SB70 initiated presumptive probation for lesser crimes and felony reclassifications for what are typically classified as nonviolent crimes.
The changes resulted in an 8% decrease in the population in 2015 than had been projected, the Urban Institute published in May 2016.
“Despite the increase in felony convictions, the presumptive probation policy and felony reclassifications played a significant role in averting South Dakota’s prison population growth in 2014 and 2015,” the Urban Institute said.
The changes required some investment from the state.
In 2014, the state invested $3.2 million to expand and provide substance use and cognitive behavioral treatment programs for people on probation and parole. This investment continued after 2014, Justice Reinvestment Initiative said.
SB70 and its reforms drew controversy, including statements that the reforms pushed cost of drug crimes to counties, that programs were not adequately funded and that too many released inmates violated probation and ended up back in prison.
2019 and the population is growing
The 2012 work group predicted that without policy changes, the state’s overall prison population would grow from 3,673 in 2012 to 4,580 in 2022.
By 2019, the LRC said the state’s overall prison population was 3,308 males and 525 females for a total of 3,833.
In March of 2019, the DOC Commission was discussing the condition of the medical unit at the Jameson in Sioux Falls.
Then Gov. Kristi Noem had about $7.3 million in her budget for building and equipping a health services building at Jameson. The Legislature approved the funding.
The year 2021 brought some turmoil at the DOC as at least three staff members were dismissed by Noem. That included the Warden Darin Young and Deputy Warden Jennifer Dreiske after getting an anonymous complaint that includes allegations of sexual harassment, nepotism, poor pay and bad equipment.
But discussions about the population and the Sioux Falls prison continued. The DLR group was hired to review the DOC facilities and recommend projects. The contract cost was about $323,000.
DLR released its report in January of 2022.
Forty years after Janklow cited issues in the Sioux Falls prison and a judge’s ruling, DLR cited multiple issues in the overall system.
Shortcomings examples were system-wide the capacities at each facility are higher than what is recommended, education and rehabilitative space is short at facilities, DLR said.
“The most significant recommendation arrived at as a resolution to many of the system’s
shortcomings is a new 1,372-bed Multi-Custody Correctional Facility. This facility would
not only replace the SDSP but also provide relief for the Mike Durfee State Prison
(MDSP), and significantly improve SDDOC’s ability to care for inmates identified as as suffering from mental and behavioral health, chronic health, and mobility issues. These
types of inmates are currently housed in various locations around the system and having
them located in a centralize facility would not only improve the amounts and types of
specialized care required, but also improve the efficiency in which such care is delivered,” the DLR study said.
The men’s prison in Sioux Falls “given its age and configuration, not efficient to operate and expensive to maintain,” the DLR study said.
A new 1,300 bed men’s facility was estimated to cost $338,537,475. That assumed approval and funding in 2022. The state prison in Sioux Falls could be decommissioned in 2027.
Another year, another study, another task force
The DLR study did prompt legislative action.
An incarceration construction fund was established but it required a report to the Legislature on incarcerations and corrections within the state.
The task force in 2022 recommended the construction of a new women’s facility in the Rapid City area on land purchased and prepared through a special appropriation in 2022 and buying land for a new men’s facility to be later constructed in the Sioux Falls area.
Lawmakers pursue a new women’s facility in Rapid City and begin to set aside money for a new men’s prison.
In November 2024, JE Dunn Construction, the construction manager hired for a men’s prison, said the guaranteed maximum price for a new men’s prison between Harrisburg and Canton was about $825 million.
The DOC presented an update on the planned men’s prison during the Nov. 14 legislative Joint Committee on Appropriations meeting. The prison would have capacity for 1,500 inmates.
The GMP was higher than the January estimate of more than $706 million from the state’s Bureau of Financial and Management. The projected prison project will be one of the largest projects built in state history.
That $825 million plan was rejected for full funding by the House in February.
And Gov. Larry Rhoden formed another prison task force called Project Prison Reset Task Force shortly after the rejection. Arrington Watkins was hired to provide another design and prison study.
The state paid $729,322 for the study which cited overcrowded facilities and that the Sioux Falls has “no hope” of satisfying safety requirements or building codes.
The study recommended a multi-custody 1,728-bed facility with the possibility of another 1,728 bed facility. If both facilities are built the cost could be more than $1 billion to $2.1 billion.
This was rejected by the prison task force. The task force agreed this summer to a project of a cost no more than $650 million for 1,500 beds. The beds would be combination of about 1,200 multi-custody and 300 minimum security dorm style beds. A site near Benson Road in Sioux Falls would be used.
Problems faced by the Commission relate to prison overcrowding, changes in the type of sentenced offenders and their program needs, rising crime rates, and public fear of crime. Prison population projections for 1995 indicate 1,729 male and 128 female inmates, substantially higher than 1,294 male and 97 female inmates in 1991
Over the previous ten years, the recidivism rate for South Dakota penitentiary inmates had been 18 percent, the lowest in the nation. Among those convicts who completed vocational courses while serving time, only 9 percent went back to prison.
