
BROCKVILLE – The union representing jail guards is applauding the Ontario government’s investment in new jails for Brockville and Kemptville and upgrades to three others.
In a statement, OPSEU President Warren “Smokey” Thomas praised Premier Doug Ford for stepping up to address “chronic problems” in the correctional system. The government’s plan will see $500 million spent over the next five years on corrections, adding 500 new staff.
As Brockville Newswatch first told you yesterday afternoon (Thursday), the government will be replacing the Brockville Jail with a new facility on the St. Lawrence Valley Correctional and Treatment Center property. The treatment center will also have a new unit dedicated for female inmates. A new Greater Ottawa Correctional Complex will be built in Kemptville.
“I’m extremely pleased to see the government making good on its plan to fix the crisis in corrections,” Thomas said in a statement.
Making “practical, meaningful” steps is “long overdue,” he added.
OPSEU represents 9,500 front-line jail workers across Ontario.
There’s no timeline when construction will begin on the Brockville and Kemptville jails.
Michael Jiggins, spokesman for local MPP Steve Clark, told Brockville Newswatch that they are in the “very early stages of development” and that until government tendering and a schedule of construction is completed “we’re unable to establish a definitive timeline for construction.”