An Olympia consultant has begun a study that could lead to closure of the prison on McNeil Island and other facilities operated by state prison and social service agencies.

Christopher Murray and Associates of Olympia will be paid $462,000 to examine not only the state prison system, but state facilities that house juvenile criminals and the developmentally disabled.

The contract was awarded last month.

The study was authorized after lawmakers this past legislative session were unable to agree on which facilities should be closed. The study, which will be overseen by Gov. Chris Gregoire’s budget office, seeks to determine how much money can be saved over the next two years by shutting down the least efficient facilities of the Department of Corrections, Juvenile Rehabilitation Administration and Residential Habitation Centers.

The Democrat-controlled state Senate introduced a budget that would have shut down McNeil Island prison and moved its 1,300 inmates elsewhere. The House did not.

Similar stalemates were reached when it came to deciding whether to close Green Hill or Maple Lane schools for teenage criminals and whether to close centers for the developmentally disabled in Yakima, Shoreline, Bremerton, Medical Lake or Buckley.

The state budget for 2009-11 assumes the state can save $12 million.

“We don’t consider that a target,” said Adam Aaseby, one of two Gregoire budget office advisers who are working with the consultants on the feasibility study. “If they can find ways to save more than $12 million – fine. If it’s less, then we’ll bring it up to the Legislature (in 2010).”

The consultants are supposed to produce a draft report by Oct. 1 and a final report to the Legislature and governor by Nov. 1. For the past month, the consultants have visited all five state-fun facilities for the developmentally disabled. That includes Rainier School in Buckley. They also visited the McNeil Island prison and state penitentiary in Walla Walla and will be going to prisons in Monroe and Pine Lodge over the next two weeks, he said.

The state’s newer prisons, such as Stafford Creek outside Aberdeen and Coyote Ridge in Eastern Washington, are less likely candidates for closure.

“Stafford Creek and Coyote Ridge are pretty new and efficiently run,” Aaseby said.

Older parts of the prison system, such as the State Reformatory in Monroe and the facility on McNeil Island, which was formerly a federal prison, are more likely candidates for closure.

The consultants and budget officers are obliged to talk to employee unions that represent workers who would be laid off, displaced or otherwise affected by a facility closure.

McNeil Island is a candidate for closure because it costs more to operate than most prisons. Because it sits on an island, the state must ferry inmates, workers, supplies and building materials back and forth and maintain terminals on the island and at Steilacoom.

Statewide associations of prosecutors and law enforcement officers oppose the closure of any prisons. They contend the state already has too few of them and consequently often lets too many inmates out of prison too soon.

The final report must recommend how to eliminate 1,580 prison beds, 235 beds at the juvenile facilities and 250 beds at the centers for the developmentally disabled. That’s about a 10 percent cut for prisons and a 20 percent or more cut for the other facilities.

The $12 million in budget savings is part of $120 million in cuts that were made to the state prisons’ overall $1.8 billion two-year budget as the Legislature made overall cuts of $4 billion to state spending for 2009-11.

joe.turner@thenewstribune.com

Joseph Turner: 360-786-1826

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