Corrections Department, Drug Agency Purchase Site for Halfway Houses

The state Department of Corrections and a regional agency that treats alcohol and drug abusers have bought industrial lots in Santa Fe Springs for the construction of two halfway houses and a youth center.

Previously a four-acre engineering plant, the property at 11015 Bloomfield Ave. has been leased and used as a treatment facility by Los Angeles Centers for Alcohol and Drug Abuse during the 18 months since the agency relocated from Norwalk’s Metropolitan State Hospital.

With the help of Santa Fe Springs city staff, the lot was divided to make room for the Department of Corrections’ proposed reentry facility for incarcerated women and their children.

Sharrell Blakeley, assistant director of the department, said the correctional center is expected to house about 70 women and children when it opens late next year. She added that the women in the program will be serving out their sentences for nonviolent, narcotics-related crimes.

“The purpose of the program is to break the intergenerational cycle of criminality,� she said. “What we’re doing is turning the women off drugs and on to their children.�