State prison officials say it's possible all of Hawai'i's women inmates on the Mainland — 175 convicts now held in a private prison in Kentucky — could be brought back and housed at the Federal Detention Center on O'ahu.

Tommy Johnson, deputy director for corrections of the state Department of Public Safety, said negotiations could begin with the federal Bureau of Prisons to house the women at the federal center near the Honolulu airport, provided state lawmakers approve extra money for their care.

Housing the women in Hawai'i would double the cost of holding them in Kentucky, Johnson said.

There is no room at the Women's Community Correctional Center in Kailua for the Mainland inmates, but the detention center may have room for all 175 inmates, he said.

The decision to house women inmates out of state has been sharply criticized by lawmakers and prison reform advocates who say most of the women were convicted of nonviolent crimes, and some are single mothers.

Some of the women convicts were the sole caregivers for their children before they were sent to prison, and lawmakers and others have questioned the impact that long separations without visits may have on the children and families back in Hawai'i.

Both the House Public Safety and Military Affairs Committee and the Senate Public Safety Committee passed bills this year instructing the Department of Public Safety to draft plans to return the women inmates to Hawai'i. The bills were not approved by the full Legislature, but state lawmakers are expected to revisit the subject in the 2008 session.

Senate Public Safety Committee Chairman Will Espero said he has heard the state may rent an entire floor of the Federal Detention Center to house 120 of the women now on the Mainland.

"If that's the case, then great. We'll be very supportive of it, but of course we have to provide them the programming and other services that the inmates will need," Espero said.

NO ROOM IN HAWAI'I

Hawai'i holds a larger percentage of its prison population outside the state than any other state in the nation. As of last week the state was holding 2,027 convicted felons in private prisons operated by Corrections Corporation of America in Arizona and Kentucky, which is more than half the total state prison population.

Prison officials have said they would prefer to house those inmates in Hawai'i correctional facilities, but there is no room here because Hawai'i has not built a new prison in the past 20 years.

State prison officials had planned to move the women prisoners on the Mainland from the Otter Creek Correctional Center in Wheelwright, Ky., to the new Saguaro Correctional Center in Eloy, Ariz., this year, but that plan has been delayed, Johnson said.

Now, Hawai'i prison officials are negotiating a one-year extension of the Otter Creek contract, and are considering moving the women to the federal lockup as "one option," Johnson said.

The state now pays about $54 per day per inmate to house the women at Otter Creek, and that is expected to increase to about $56 per day under the new contract being negotiated with CCA.

The state pays $80.54 per inmate per day to house about 150 prisoners in rented beds at the Federal Detention Center, and Johnson said he expects the detention center would house the women for a similar rate.

However, the state would also have to put up money to provide rehabilitative programming for the women that is now available at Otter Creek, such as drug treatment and parenting classes. Those programs would not be provided under a federal contract, which means the state would have to establish those services at the detention center.

'IT'S ABSURD'

Kat Brady, coordinator of the Community Alliance on Prisons, said many of the women now in prison do not need to be held in secure settings such as Otter Creek, the Federal Detention Center or the Women's Community Correctional Center.

Brady cited Department of Public Safety statistics that show 40 percent of Hawai'i's sentenced women inmates in 2006 were classified as community custody, meaning they were eligible for work furlough, extended furlough or residential transitional living centers outside of the prison system.

Additionally, about 21 percent of the women inmates were classified as minimum custody inmates. According to the Department Public Safety, minimum security prisoners can be placed in less restrictive minimum security prison settings, or can be supervised in the community.

"Instead of extending the contract for that coal pit, why don't they instead get more transition beds in the community, and let those women out who are community custody, who the department itself says can be in the community with no supervision?" Brady said.

"It's absurd that we keep using the most expensive sanction to deal with people who are community custody. It's absurd, it's immoral, it's expensive and it doesn't help anybody."

Reach Kevin Dayton at kdayton@honoluluadvertiser.com.