Newspaper Articles About North Rehabilitation Facility
(and related topics) a 291-bed special detention and treatment center for King County inmates.

  Seattle-Times 
Web Archive

Maleng seeks more treatment, less jail time for drug offenders, Tuesday January 22, 2002

'Ugly' cuts in county budget: Day-care subsidy among Sims' targets to close $41 million gap, by Eric Pryne (a general discussion on 2002 budget--does not mention NRF)  10/14/01

A diploma is a second chance  6/27/99  (GED graduates)

Roadside workers are trying to get clean  6/24/98

" What we need is treatment on demand," says Sims 1/21/98

After you're released, where are you going to stay? 10/16/97

Some inmates now may have to pay for jail 4/22/97

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Seattle-Post-Intelligencer Web Archive

A court where people are winning in the war on drugs, By Susan Paynter Friday, January 25, 2002

Don't divert funds from drug treatment [Editorial] Thursday, January 24, 2002  (Save money by shortening jail sentences and spend the savings on chemical dependency treatment.

Jails and prisons search for better ways to rehabilitate lawbreakers. "Meditation holds silent promise for prisoners," By Vanessa Ho, Saturday, August 11, 2001

We'd be ahead to assume it's a trend, [Editorial] Sunday, August 5, 2001 Seattle ranked first among 21 metropolitan areas in drug-related visits to hospital emergency rooms 8/5/01

 

Eastside Journal Online

Cities: Overcrowding, costs bring look at other locations to house inmates 8/4/01

Prosecuting Attorney Norm Maleng wants the state to shorten prison sentences for drug users and dealers and use the savings to treat their addictions. 2/25/01

  

South County Journal Online

Clipping away the jail time  1/14/01

Cities, county in jail talks: Overcrowding, costs bring look at other locations to house inmates   08/01/01

 

Seattle-Post Intelligencer

Monday, July 2, 2001

Rehabilitation center for inmates
 may be eliminated
BY MIKE LEWIS
P-I reporter

     King County's respected inmate rehabilitation agency faces an uncertain future as rumors circulate that the county executive has targeted it for the budget chopping block.
     "We're hearing that they are going to eliminate us," said one caseworker at the North Rehabilitation Center in Shoreline who, fearing reprisals, asked to remain anonymous.  "If they close us, what are they going to do with the 300 (inmates)?"
     Elaine Kraft , a spokeswoman for Executive Ron Sims , declined to say that the center was targeted for elimination.  But she also would not guarantee its survival, saying only that it "remains under consideration" for cuts.
     A decline in revenue growth and state funding and an increase in service demands have forced the county to slash its budget.
     While the executive office has trimmed its own staff, merged agencies and eliminated 130 jobs, savings remain about $30 million to $36 million short of what is needed.
     Advocates for the rehabilitation center are scheduled to make a presentation at a hearing today organized by County Councilwoman Maggi Fimia .  Through a spokesman, the Shoreline Democrat said she wanted to see "what (Sims) is doing and thinking regarding" the rehab center.
     Founded in 1981 and with a current annual operating budget of $7 million, the facility provides addiction and anger-management counseling, therapy and high school diplomas and job placement for 300 low-level offenders who are nearing release from county jail.  The center has drawn wide praise from public officials, its own caseworkers and other jail counselors not affiliated with the center.
     "The inmates at the main jail hope to get in the program, said Mary Manning, women's Catholic chaplain at the downtown main jail.  "These people are not career criminals.  The program helps them to stabilize their lives," she said, adding that getting into the center is a "carrot" for good behavior while in the main jail.
     Council budget Chairman Rob McKenna , R-Bellevue, said he wants to know more about the program before any decisions are made.  Citing the center's own statistics that claim it inmates have the lowest recidivism rate in the state, McKenna said even if there is a fiscal rationale for eliminating it, "there might not be a policy rationale.  My understanding is that they have been quite successful."

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Photo of NRF buildings being torn down: 5/27/05 (below).

"Here is a picture that might be of general interest.  The easternmost quarter of 16S is still standing as of the holiday weekend.  The back part has been demolished and everything to the south of 16S is down and hauled away.  The cloud in the picture may say it all."  
               Charlie Brown

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