{"id":2020664,"date":"2023-09-03T06:21:01","date_gmt":"2023-09-03T10:21:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gavin-newsoms-secret-360-million-plan-to-revamp-san-quentin-prison\/"},"modified":"2023-09-03T06:26:07","modified_gmt":"2023-09-03T10:26:07","slug":"gavin-newsoms-secret-360-million-plan-to-revamp-san-quentin-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gavin-newsoms-secret-360-million-plan-to-revamp-san-quentin-prison\/","title":{"rendered":"Gavin Newsom&#8217;s covert $360M scheme to transform San Quentin prison."},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fgavin-newsoms-secret-360-million-plan-to-revamp-san-quentin-prison%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2020664&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><h2>Outrage Over Gov.\u200c Newsom&#8217;s Secretive Plan to \u2062Transform San Quentin Prison<\/h2>\n<p>Gov. Gavin\u200c Newsom&#8217;s (D-CA) \u200d$360 million \u200bplan to \u200ctransform the notorious San Quentin prison is sparking\u2064 outrage from critics\u2062 who claim the Democrat \u200bis holding secret \u200cmeetings with no oversight and purposely keeping the public in the dark.<\/p>\n<p>Republican lawmakers and prison advocates have teamed up to demand more transparency on the mystery multimillion-dollar effort to remake the prison into a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/exclusive-american-counterpunch-governor-greg-abbott-touts-his-state-as-the-land-of-freedom-and-opportunity\/\" title=\"Exclusive -- American Counterpunch: Governor Greg Abbott Touts His State as the Land of Freedom and Opportunity\">rehabilitation center<\/a> with a college-like \u200csetting, complete with a student union and \u200ba coffee shop for inmates.<\/p>\n<h3>Calls for Transparency<\/h3>\n<p>Brian Kaneda\u200b of CURB, a criminal justice reform coalition, \u2064called spending so much on new prison\u200c infrastructure &#8220;a \u200dstep \u2062in the wrong direction.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Newsom hand-picked a 21-member advisory\u2064 council in June to help shape the new facility&#8217;s design. Members include\u2064 senior officials from\u200d San Quentin as well as\u2064 top political allies\u200d for Newsom like Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg. The group has met five times \u2064since\u2062 June, but what was\u200d discussed has not been disclosed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If\u200b there&#8217;s\u200d no \u200bpublic\u200c accessibility to the San Quentin <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/breaking-president-trump-gives-pardons-to-73-individuals-and-commutes-another-70-sentences-steve-bannon-is-included\/\" title=\"BREAKING: President Trump Gives Pardons to 73 Individuals and Commutes Another 70 Sentences \u2013 Steve Bannon Is Included\">advisory council<\/a> meetings, that&#8217;s a really significant concern that I think people aren&#8217;t paying enough attention to,&#8221; Kaneda told the Associated Press.<\/p>\n<p>Even though the council has\u200c tentatively said it will provide a preliminary \u2063report sometime in September, people have remained skeptical. A more formal\u2063 report is expected in December, though, again, the date is up \u2062in the air.<\/p>\n<p>Lack of Transparency and Mounting Frustration<\/p>\n<p>What has been apparent is Newsom&#8217;s lack of transparency\u200d and the frustration mounting\u2063 over\u2064 the massive \u200bprice tag at a time when the state is running a \u2062nearly\u2062 $32 billion deficit.<\/p>\n<p>Republican \u2062Assemblyman Tom Lackey, who sits \u2062on the budget subcommittee on public safety, said Newsom did not seek lawmakers\u2019 input.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re the oversight, \u200dsupposedly,\u201d he said. \u201cSo how can you oversee something that has such minimal\u2062 amount of communication?\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>A New Vision\u2064 for\u200d San Quentin<\/h3>\n<p>Earlier this year, Newsom told the Los Angeles Times he wanted to shift the public&#8217;s perception of \u2064prison by &#8220;ending\u2064 San \u200cQuentin as we know it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>By 2025, \u2064Newsom wants California&#8217;s first and most infamous prison complex, \u200bwhich \u200dhas housed \u2064Charles\u2062 Manson, \u2062Sirhan Sirhan, and Scott Peterson, to be \u200dknown for \u2064being \u200bthe best at offering education and job skills\u200b to those in \u200bCalifornia&#8217;s prison system. San Quentin will no \u200clonger be a menacing-looking complex but \u2062will be converted \u2063into a peppy place for &#8220;turning out good neighbors&#8221; and &#8220;incorporating Scandinavian methods.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Inspiration from Norway<\/p>\n<p>Officials from California&#8217;s \u2063Department of Corrections and \u2062Rehabilitation toured Norwegian prisons in 2019 and came back with a positive view. The \u2062maximum security prisons they saw were outfitted to look\u2062 more like dorm rooms with furniture,\u200b chairs, and desks as opposed to overcrowded century-old cells. Some even had TVs.\u200b Inmates also had\u200d access \u2064to the kitchen and got along with their peers and staff. Oregon and North Dakota have also pulled\u2062 inspiration from Norway&#8217;s\u2063 prison\u200c policies.<\/p>\n<p>A Controversial Makeover<\/p>\n<p>After the remodel, San Quentin State\u2063 Prison, which was opened in 1854, will be renamed the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center. More than 500 inmates who are \u2062currently serving death sentences there will be reshuffled to other facilities across the \u200cstate.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe \u200bwant to be the preeminent restorative justice\u200d facility \u2063in\u2064 the world \u2014\u2062 that\u2019s the goal,\u201d Newsom \u2063said in\u200d March from an on-site warehouse that will purportedly be used as the main site. \u201cSan Quentin is iconic, San Quentin is known worldwide. If San Quentin can do it, it can be done anywhere else.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Concerns and \u2063Lack of Oversight<\/p>\n<p>Despite the aspirations, former \u2062inmates like Thanh Tran, who was locked up between 2018\u200d to 2022, said the whole process of \u2064giving San Quentin a makeover might\u2063 sound nice, but pivotal information about \u2063the project\u2064 has been kept private.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The governor has made his choice,&#8221; Tran, who now works \u2064for\u200d the Ella Baker Center for\u2062 Human Rights,\u2063 told\u2064 the Associated Press. &#8220;He\u200d has given this\u2062 unfettered power to this advisory council that is allowed to meet in \u2064secret, and we are boxed out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Initially, state lawmakers from both sides \u200dof the aisle laughed when Newsom&#8217;s office told them the \u200c$360 million \u2064price tag and \u2063rejected it outright. However, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gavin-newsoms-secret-360-million-plan-to-revamp-san-quentin-prison\/\" title=\"Gavin Newsom's covert 0M scheme to transform San Quentin prison.\">budget \u200dlawmakers eventually passed provisions<\/a> that would have allowed them to appoint at\u200c least \u2064two members \u200bto Newsom&#8217;s secret advisory board and would have required publicly \u200dheld\u200d meetings \u200band updates. But, in \u2062a last-minute twist, they signed off on Newsom&#8217;s entire deal,\u200b trading \u200daway oversight and\u2062 accountability.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>San Quentin prison. Critics are furious over Gov. Newsom&#8217;s secretive $360 million plan, accusing him of avoiding oversight and keeping the public uninformed. Republican lawmakers and prison advocates are joining forces to demand transparency regarding this controversial project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2020665,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2020664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2020664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2020664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2020664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2020665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2020664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2020664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2020664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}