An op ed by former Maine Governor Paul LePage about the recent history of the Downeast Correctional Facility (DCF) in Washington County has a number of those who were involved saying that LePage has it wrong. "If he wants to argue that we shouldn't have spent the money, that's fine. To disagree is fine, that's political. But that's not what he's doing," says Rep. Will Tuell of East Machias. Governor Janet Mills' Press Secretary Lindsay Crete says, "Former Governor LePage can attempt to rewrite history, but the people of Washington County know better; he's not telling the truth."
     DCF, located in Bucks Harbor, operated for many years as a minimum security pre release center for inmates to learn job training skills to help them reenter the workforce. Many of the inmates worked at local businesses, including the wild blueberry industry, and also used their welding, woodworking and construction skills to provide donated services to volunteer fire departments and area nonprofits. At one time it housed over 150 inmates.
     The DCF campus was created in 1985 when the state bought the property from the U.S. Air Force. Over time it came on the legislative radar for repair and update funds, which led in 2016 to legislation for a $147 million bond to expand the Windham prison, with $10 million designated to fund a pre release center in Washington County.
     The bond legislation did not specify whether the pre release center would be new or be incorporated into the existing DCF facility, but former State Senator Joyce Maker of Calais remembers the discussions leading up to it and notes that contrary to LePage's op ed statements about other governors wanting to close DCF, "Governor [Angus] King proposed building a new facility Downeast, and Governor [John] Baldacci proposed a combined facility." Maker remembers visiting King and asking him, one on one, about DCF. "He said he would never close DCF. It was too important." Tuell says of Governor Mills, "If she truly wanted to close it [as LePage's op ed states], she could have done what he did and denied the bond terms had funding for DCF. He denied it existed. She didn't."
     Despite the bond funding and budgeted funding for that year's cycle including DCF as a line item, on February 9, 2017, LePage closed the prison with no notice. In his op ed, LePage states that "then Attorney General Janet Mills spent tens of thousands of our taxpayer dollars using the courts to try and keep the work release prison" open. Tuell explains, "What he did in February of that year was illegal. That's the reality." Mills, he goes on to say, "was defending the legislature's standing, and the courts agreed." Of Mills' action as attorney general, Maker says, "She was very helpful in telling us the law. There wasn't anything political about it." Because the legislature had designated funding for DCF in its budget, the governor could not close the prison without the legislature's approval.
     Crete says, "Then Attorney General Mills recognized that, without the approval of the legislature, LePage's closure of the facility was illegal, and she refused to defend his administration in court." Her office joined an opposing lawsuit brought by the Washington County Commission and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Crete states, "But rather than reverse this ill advised decision, the former governor [LePage] doubled down and decided to spend tens of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money to defend his illegal move. That money went to waste because the Superior Court rejected LePage's arguments ... writing that LePage overstepped his authority and ordering him to continue operating the facility."
     When LePage was forced by the courts to reopen DCF, it was operated with a skeleton crew. LePage commuted many of the prisoners' sentences and proposed closure and replacement with a 20 bed pod based in Machias, remembers Tuell, which is not the plan LePage claims in his op ed that he proposed. "There were no real details provided to the Criminal Justice Committee," Tuell says. Maker points to the legislative record and says, "Nowhere was there a formal plan presented."
     At the time of legislative hearings, LePage senior policy analyst Aaron Chadbourne described a possible plan for a 20 bed facility that would act as a pilot project for the rest of the state and might lead to another satellite location in Washington County. However, Chadbourne noted that LePage and the Department of Corrections would want the DCF facility sold before moving forward. Business owners who hired DCF inmates for work release jobs did not respond positively to the pod concept, citing concerns about the small number of workers available, the reluctance to be responsible for possible DCF pod dormitories on their business property and more.
     In the meantime, the prison was shut down in 2018 when funding ran out and its future became uncertain. Maker says, "We need to be looking out for Washington County, and he [LePage] certainly hasn't helped."
     When Mills became governor she directed the "Department of Corrections to work closely with the people of Washington County, including their lawmakers, to develop a plan," explains Crete. At the time Senator Marianne Moore of Calais said, "I am happy to have been able to work with Governor Mills and my fellow Washington County delegation to finally put to rest the issue of Downeast Correctional Facility so the local community can finally move forward with a resolution." She added, "While the new facility won't be to the scale of what DCF once was, it will once again provide an important service to our state and economy." An early September opening date is planned for the new facility, which will house about 50 minimum security inmates and employ about two dozen staff.
     Crete says, "The administration is proud to have rectified the prior administration's mistake as best it could, and we are grateful for the bipartisan work that went into the project. As a result, the new Downeast Correctional Facility is 50% complete, and, when done, it will provide full time, good paying jobs and once again support the region's economy." Governor Mills, she adds, "is not interested in playing politics. She is interested in doing right by the people of Washington County and delivering for them -- and that's what her administration has done. The facts simply don't say the same for LePage -- even as he tries to rewrite them."