A steady flow of Penticton residents and property owners have been making their way to City Hall since the municipality began a public opinion process Tuesday morning to garner input regarding the potential location, construction and operation of a proposed 360-cell provincial correctional centre within city limits.
The city submitted two sites to the provincial government in March — one on Campbell Mountain and the other near the Cantex gravel pit — as part of a larger regional bid. However, facing growing public opposition, council chose to hold a vote on the matter.
As of Thursday afternoon, according to the city’s deputy clerk Karen Burley, just over 3,500 of Penticton’s roughly 26,000 eligible voters had cast a ballot.
Anti-prison advocate Lindsey Hall said he voted against the facility because he fears the city will be stigmatized as a prison town if the centre is built here.
“Wherever I have travelled in the world … it is the prison town that is the delinquent one and that has the low property values because people don’t want to live there, let alone visit as a tourist,” he said.
Hall pointed to the 2006 Census which he said demonstrated that Penticton had not seen a significant net increase in population despite last decade’s boom in the construction of residential developments.
“That means that it has been outside owners from Alberta or Vancouver who have been buying summer vacation property here,” he asserted. “If they see (the prison) as a negative on the town and it becomes a place where they do not want to be spending their vacation, can you imagine the glut of property that could go onto the market just from those people selling off their summer properties? That will drive down everybody’s property value.”
Hall said he is also worried that a prison would drive businesses out of town and be a deciding factor in other businesses not locating or expanding into Penticton.
“We cannot afford to take that chance,” he said.
Citing a study from the University of Adelaide in Australia, Hall said he does not believe the facility will have a positive effect on Penticton’s economy.
“The findings are concurrent with many other reports that in more than 250 counties in the United States that have (correctional centres) none of them have done well with a prison,” he said. “All the possible positives turned out to be negatives. For example, staff tend not to live in the host community because they don’t want to stumble upon the inmates out on day passes.
“No matter which way you look at it, a prison will not be good for Penticton.”
Coun. Mike Pearce, who voted for the correctional centre, disagrees.
A proponent of trying to bring the prison to Penticton since the Solicitor General indicated that such a facility would be awarded to a municipality in the Okanagan, Pearce said the jobs and construction/maintenance money injected into the city’s economy would be significant.
“The one key reason I am in favour of this is for the further substantial economic development of Penticton,” he said. “The number of jobs it will create and the flow of income would be substantial.”
Pearce said he believes the fiscal benefit could total up to $1 billion over 10 years.
“The bottom line is that they got it projected at over $200 million to build,” he said. “There will also be a payroll of about $40 million a year and then the multiplier effect of that money going around the community as people shop and eat or do whatever.”
Pearce said the city “unequivocally needs” such an economic stimulus.
“Look at all the people without jobs around here,” Pearce said. “Then look at the influx of external monies into the community and look at what it will generate.”
Pearce said after touring some correctional centres in the Lower Mainland and then hearing from officials who work at prisons, he is convinced that the facilities are innocuous.
“It is not a big deal to have a prison here. It is a deal in a lot of people’s mind but today prisons are safe. It is not like Hollywood anymore. It is a business, just like bringing a casino here or anything else,” he said.
The opinion poll will be open through Saturday between the hours of 8:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. at City Hall. Results will be available soon after the polls close on our website at pentictonwesternnews.com.
city@pentictonwesternnews.com
