Enterprises Proposed for New Prison on Otay Mesa

More than 500 jobs may be added to the San Diego area work force in 1987, but not just anyone can apply. Only inmates in the new state prison at Otay Mesa need apply for the skilled jobs inside the prison’s walls.

A textile mill, an optical lab, a vehicle repair shop and a bakery, projects that officials say will give inmates a vocation and save the state money, are planned for the prison, which is expected to open in late 1986.

Before deciding whether to establish the prison enterprises, the state Prison Industry Authority will hold public hearings Aug. 21 and 22 in San Diego.

Dick Murray, a spokesman for the Prison Industry Authority, said the proposals are part of a plan by the governor to employ more of the state’s inmates. Of the 47,000 inmates in the state, 3,700 are employed, Murray said. Under the governor’s plan, 9,500 will be employed by 1990.

The textile mill, repair shop and bakery are new to the state prison system, which has traditionally produced license plates and institutional clothing, Murray said.

“We have to look at any possible thing we can go into,” he said. “We’re getting more inmates than we have jobs for. Any inmate who wants to work is given the opportunity. We try to utilize the skills he brought in, if any.”

Prison industry officials hope the optical lab will produce 75,000 pairs of eyeglasses a year, and supply about a quarter of the vision needs of Medi-Cal patients. A Medi-Cal spokesman said no agreement has been made between the prison authority and Medi-Cal.

The Vacaville state prison has a laboratory that produces eyeglasses for all state prisoners and safety glasses for state workers, and Murray said the quality of its work is equal to that produced commercially.

Medi-Cal patients now take their eyeglass prescriptions to an optician who then bills Medi-Cal. With prison inmates manufacturing a large number of glasses, the state would save money on labor costs and markup. Inmate wages start at 25 cents an hour.

Although state prisons, such as the Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo, have long produced clothing to be used in state agencies, the plant at Otay Mesa would have the capability of producing cloth from raw cotton. Murray said inmates would learn skills such as spinning, weaving and dying. Two hundred eighty-five jobs are projected for the mill, which would produce towels, sheets and other textile goods for use in state institutions such as hospitals.

The Prison Industry Authority expects to spend $3,146,747 on looms and other equipment for manufacturing cloth and earn about $2.5 million a year on textile sales.

Murray said he expects to hear some opposition from the public over lost jobs in the private sector. “People say, ‘We’re tax-paying citizens and you’re replacing our jobs.’ ” One or more of the projects may be abandoned, he said, “if there is a large impact on private industry.”