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Chief talks prison issues with Holmesburg

By Diane Prokop

Times Staff Writer

The name "Holmesburg" has been associated with a prison for more a century, but that doesn't mean Holmesburg residents have gotten comfortable with it.

About 30 members of the Holmesburg Civic Association turned out last week to hear Philadelphia Prisons Commissioner Louis Giorla detail plans the city is considering that would increase the use of Holmesburg Prison, at 8215 Torresdale Ave., by housing 600 prisoners there.

Currently there are 100 to 120 low-custody inmates - for example, a person sentenced to weekends for driving under the influence - housed in four trailers on the site. Other parts of Holmesburg are used for the city Community Life Improvement Program, or CLIP, which spruces up local neighborhoods; film productions; and as a training academy for correctional officers.

According to Giorla, the cellblocks of the old prison are laid out like a wagon wheel. Driven by a rising inmate population of about 9,200 in the city prisons system, the department's proposal would demolish half of the wagon-wheel layout for construction of A-frame tent structures that would house low-custody inmates.

Their offenses would be mostly misdemeanors, such as theft, prostitution, burglary, criminal trespass or possibly simple or aggravated assault. A single perimeter fence would enclose the tents within the 35-foot stone walls of Holmesburg Prison.

While the prisons system would like to confine its operations to the complex on State Road, between Rhawn and Ashburner streets, it would like to demolish the crowded and antiquated House of Corrections, which was built in 1854 and renovated in 1927, along with the Detention Center, built in 1963. That would create space for new facilities to house prisoners, including those who would be at Holmesburg.

A timetable has not been set, but Giorla estimated that demolishing and rebuilding the State Road facilities could take six years.

"We, the city, would like to put the plan in motion," he told residents at the meeting.

Giorla also told them that he wasn't going to make any promises.

Nearly two decades ago, city administrators promised the neighborhood that when the $140 million Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility opened in 1995 at the State Road complex, Holmesburg Prison would be closed for good.

"I'll tell you what we're going to do, when we do it, and how we're going to do it," Giorla said.

The prisons commissioner, a Tacony resident, assured civic members that he shares their safety concerns. He has two grandchildren attending the New Foundations Charter School at 8001 Torresdale Ave.

"I have a stake in this," he said.

The Holmesburg Prison staff conducts five population counts a day, he explained. As to walk-away inmates: "If they are sentenced to work release, you have to let them out. Some don't come back," Giorla said.

Residents asked if other options had been examined.