Correctional facility upgrades planned for Eastern Ontario

St. Lawrence Valley Correctional and Treatment Centre in Brockville, Ont. Photo courtesy PCL Construction.

Ontario’s government recently announced details about new construction and upgrade projects to modernize adult correctional facilities across the province’s eastern region. The goal is to address issues of overcrowding and create new spaces for mental health services, staff training and inmate programs.

The modernization strategy takes into account recommendations made by the Independent Review of Ontario Corrections (IROC) and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), among others, and will include:

• building a new Greater Ottawa Correctional Complex on an existing, government-owned site of the former Kemptville College of Agricultural Technology, to improve staff and inmate safety.
• replacing the Brockville Jail—currently the oldest in the province, built in 1842—with a new facility to increase capacity and improve access to services and programming in the area.
• expanding the St. Lawrence Valley Correctional and Treatment Centre (SLVCTC) in Brockville and the Quinte Detention Centre in Napanee to add capacity and improve acute mental health services for incarcerated women, complementing additional beds at Ontario Shores.
• renovating the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre (OCDC) to better accommodate programming for inmates, along with other initiatives.

“Modernizing outdated infrastructure and building new facilities will create a better and safer environment for our staff and address overcrowding in many of our institutions,” says Sylvia Jones, Ontario’s solicitor general.