West County Detention Facility is a large coeducational adult medium security Contra Costa County jail in Richmond, California opened in 1991. [1]
West County Detention Facility is a large coeducational adult medium security Contra Costa County jail in Richmond, California opened in 1991. [1]
WCDF is located in the Point Pinole area of the city between Parchester Village to the south, Point Pinole Regional Shoreline to the west and the Hilltop area to the east. The jail can house up to 1,093 inmates. [1] There are five different housing areas, four for males and one for females. [1] The jail is served by route 71 AC Transit bus service seven days a week and route 376 late night. [2] also houses the county's "special needs" inmates. [1]
In 2012, Lori Haley, a spokeswoman for ICE and the Department of Homeland Security, said, "The West County Detention Facility opened in 1991 and is one of nine facilities in California contracted by ICE to hold detainees. It holds about 1,000 inmates. Of that number, an average of 120 to 150 individuals are there under ICE custody and are being processed for removal from the United States based on violations of immigration laws." [3]
West County Detention Facility is proceeding with the project to expand jail services. The project will cost $25 million in construction and $5 million a year after the construction. The money is going towards the construction of a high-security wing that can jail 400 extra inmates who are currently housed at the Martinez Detention Facility. The supporters of this project state that the project will allow improved mental health treatment and other services to inmates at the Martinez jail by transporting inmates to the newly constructed wing at West County Detention Facility. The opponents, however, state that the project is wrongly focusing on people already detained and not on prevention. [4]
The West County Detention Facility offers multiple programs and spaces for inmates to utilize. The spaces provided for them include the following: courtyards, educational classrooms and library facilities. The facility offers programs that the inmates can take advantage of, such as, DEUCE (substance abuse, anger and stress management, job development), computer applications including web design, adult basic education, independent study, transitional services, English as a Second Language (ESL), GED / High School Diploma preparation and testing, sign making, and chaplain program. [5]
In December 2017, Senator Dianne Feinstein formally asked ICE to investigate the detention facility, where multiple federal detainees have stated that they were not allowed to use restrooms. Feinstein wrote, "It has been reported that the conditions are so deplorable that detainees are requesting deportation over pursuing claims in immigration court" [6]
Contra Costa County is a county located in the U.S. state of California, in the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 1,165,927. The county seat is Martinez. It occupies the northern portion of the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area and is primarily suburban. The county's name refers to its position on the other side of the bay from San Francisco. Contra Costa County is included in the San Francisco–Oakland–Berkeley, CA Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Point Pinole Regional Shoreline is a regional park on the shores of the San Pablo Bay, California, in the United States. It is approximately 2,315 acres (9.37 km2) in area, and is operated by the East Bay Regional Park District. It includes the Dotson Family Marsh and the Point Pinole Lagoon and hosts the North Richmond Shoreline Festival.
WestCAT is a public transportation service in western Contra Costa County. It is a service of the Western Contra Costa Transit Authority.
Immigration detention is the policy of holding individuals suspected of visa violations, illegal entry or unauthorized arrival, as well as those subject to deportation and removal until a decision is made by immigration authorities to grant a visa and release them into the community, or to repatriate them to their country of departure. Mandatory detention refers to the practice of compulsorily detaining or imprisoning people who are considered to be illegal immigrants or unauthorized arrivals into a country. Some countries have set a maximum period of detention, while others permit indefinite detention.
CoreCivic, Inc. formerly the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), is a company that owns and manages private prisons and detention centers and operates others on a concession basis. Co-founded in 1983 in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas W. Beasley, Robert Crants, and T. Don Hutto, it received investments from the Tennessee Valley Authority, Vanderbilt University, and Jack C. Massey, the founder of Hospital Corporation of America.
The Richmond Parkway Transit Center, or RPTC, is a park and ride lot and bus terminal located in Richmond, California. It is named after the adjacent Richmond Parkway and serves as a transfer point for WestCAT and AC Transit. The center is situated on the corner of Richmond Parkway and Blume Drive, near the Pinole border and adjacent to Interstate 80 and the Hilltop Plaza shopping center.
Parchester Village is a planned majority African-American village in northwestern Richmond, California that was the first in the state to sell to blacks.
The GEO Group, Inc. (GEO) is a publicly traded C corporation that invests in private prisons and mental health facilities in the United States, Australia, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. Headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, the company's facilities include immigration detention centers, minimum security detention centers, and mental-health and residential-treatment facilities. It also operates government-owned facilities pursuant to management contracts. As of December 31, 2021, the company managed and/or owned 86,000 beds at 106 facilities. In 2019, agencies of the federal government of the United States generated 53% of the company's revenues. Up until 2021 the company was designated as a real estate investment trust, at which time the board of directors elected to reclassify as a C corporation under the stated goal of reducing the company's debt.
Sobrante Ridge Regional Preserve (SRRP) is a regional park in Richmond, Contra Costa County, California and is part of the East Bay Regional Parks (EBRPD) system. The park preserves one of the few habitats of the Alameda manzanita, which is deemed extremely rare, according to EBRPD.
Hilltop Green or "The Green"is a neighborhood in Richmond, California bordering the city of Pinole, the census-designated place of El Sobrante, the neighborhood of Hilltop, and Hilltop Mall.
Hercules Transit Center is a major commuter hub in the western Contra Costa County city of Hercules, California. It is anchored by WestCAT bus services. The center was originally on San Pablo Avenue. In August 2009, the transit center was relocated to the other side of I-80 with additional paid parking, which is $3/day.
Hercules station is a proposed intermodal infill train station and ferry terminal in Hercules, California in Contra Costa County. It is to be the first direct Amtrak-to-ferry transit hub in the San Francisco Bay Area and will be constructed in between the existing Richmond and Martinez stations. By July 2018, three of the station's six construction phases had been complete, including street at Bay Trail approaches. However, no proposed opening date has yet been announced by the City of Hercules.
The Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility was established in 1993 as the nation’s first publicly owned and privately operated adult secure correctional facility and is currently operated by the Central Falls Detention Facility Corporation. This special non-profit, quasi-public detention facility was developed for use by the United States Marshal Service (USMS) in the Northeast and was later extended to include the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) from 2005 to 2008 and again starting in 2019. Beginning in October 2011, the facility began serving the United States Navy, housing Navy personnel who have been placed in the custody of the General Court-Martial Convening Authority (GCMC). The facility operates at maximum security utilizing an architectural and high-tech design and construction containment system. A $47 million expansion was completed in December 2006 and increased the maximum occupancy from 300 all-male housing to its current capacity of 770 including a 40-bed unit for female detainees. It is the corporation's only facility.
The United States government holds tens of thousands of immigrants in detention under the control of Customs and Border Protection and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Abella Center formerly International Marketplace and originally El Portal Shopping Center is a mixed-use city services, business, shopping center and housing village transit-oriented development that was formerly a mall in San Pablo, California.
Willacy County Correctional Center is a closed detention center located on the east side of Route 77, at the edge of Raymondville City, Willacy County, Texas, United States.
Doctors Medical Center was an eight-story, 120-bed public hospital in San Pablo, California which served 250,000 residents in western Contra Costa County from 1954 to 2015.
The COVID-19 pandemic in U.S. immigration detention has been covered extensively since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. More than 38,000 people were detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) at the time of the outbreak of COVID-19 in the United States. ICE's response to the outbreak in detention facilities has been widely characterized as substandard and dangerous. Harmful practices have been reported in numerous facilities managed by third-party private contractors with ICE. For example, reports found that HDQ Neutral disinfectant was used over 50 times per day in un-ventilated areas, which caused pain, bleeding, and severe illness to numerous people held in Adelanto Detention Center, a private prison managed by GEO Group Inc.
Hudson County Correctional Facility (HCCF) is a prison operated by Hudson County, New Jersey located in Kearny, New Jersey. The HCCF houses both women and men, with separate wards for women and men.
The Glades County Detention Center, at 1297 East State Road 78 in remote Moore Haven, Florida, United States, opened in 2007 with 440 beds. Operated by the Glades County Sheriff's Office, besides Glades County arrestees, 90% of its beds house Immigration and Customs Enforcement detainees, which were previously spread around many county jails. It is Glades County's largest employer. It has been the site of widespread abuses, and in 2022, 17 members of Congress asked that it be closed.