Leo Chesney Correctional Facility closing in Live Oak

The Leo Chesney Community Correctional Facility for women will close Sept. 30 when the state contract with a Florida-based corporation ends, says a California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesman.

"There is no appropriation in the state budget to continue funding that contract," Ralph Jackson said Friday.

Live Oak City Manager Jim Goodwin said the loss of the community's largest private employer will be significant: Sixty-five full-time employees along with 12 part-time workers.

A decade ago, an effort to close such facilities spurred communities to rally in a successful effort to keep them open, Goodwin said, although he acknowledged state finances are now much different.

"It's a different time — a different budget climate," he said.

Female inmates provided maintenance of the city's parks, open space and buildings that saves the city about $200,000 yearly, Goodwin noted. Loss of that service will require Live Oak to rethink how it handles such maintenance, he said.

The GEO Group Inc. in Florida that contracted with the state to operate the site has historically been very generous in supporting nonprofit organizations in Live Oak, Goodwin said.

Jackson said Leo Chesney's capacity is 305 inmates. Five state corrections staff worked there along with contract staff from the GEO Group, he said.

GEO officials were unavailable for comment.

Rocklin resident Jeff Doyle, a former California correctional officer and retired state parole agent who writes the pacovilla.com blog about corrections-related issues, said in May when concerns arose about the facility's future that the state contract to operate Leo Chesney made it a more likely candidate to be cut.

"Politically it's much harder to eliminate state jobs than it is a contract," Doyle said.

The Leo Chesney facility opened in 1989.

"They've been good neighbors," said Mayor Gary Baland. "I can't think of a complaint or anything negative about the facility at all."