At its peak, the island of Alcatraz housed more than 260 prisoners, with famous gangsters such as Al Capone, George “Machine Gun” Kelly and James “Whitey” Bulger in the position of rocky rocky.
With its closure in 1963 after it fell into poor condition, the federal prison against San Francisco found a new life as a popular tourist destination, one that continues to attract more than one million visitors a year as a national historical milestone.
All that could change again if President Donald Trump comes out with his. Trump wrote on Sunday on social networks that he is directing to the Federal Prison Office, the Department of Justice and other agencies to “reopen a substantially expanded and rebuilt Alcatraz” to the “ruthless and violent criminals” more. “
But federal corrections and historians experts warn that, although this project can be especially “symbolic” for Trump, any plan would be incredibly expensive and inefficient, particularly when the federal government’s mission is to reduce spending and prisons remain tense for personnel shortage.
“You would enter and basically delete a national milestone only to establish a prison that would literally be for optics mainly, because it does not make more financial sense to establish something like that there,” said Michael Esslinger, who has written five books about the history of Alcatraz and estimates that he has visited the island at least 500 times.
The National Parks Service Administer Alcatraz.
J. Elizabeth Peace, a spokeswoman for the department of the interior of the United States, said in an email that “the president’s statement speaks for herself” and refused to comment more.
Before Alcatraz closed, it was determined that he would take at least $ 4 million to renew it and that the physical isolation of the island was an important reason why it cost so much to maintain. For example, fresh water had to go to the island every week.
In a press release issued in 1962, BOP director James Bennett said it was not an “economically solid policy” to invest millions of dollars to rehabilitate Alcatraz. The accommodation of an inmate in Alcatraz cost more than three times what it costs in Atlanta, said the Bop.
It is not clear how much it cost to build a new prison in Alcatraz from scratch. The newly installed director of the BOP, William Marshall III, said in a statement on Monday that he ordered an evaluation of the “next steps” for an American penitentiary.
“USP Alcatraz has a rich story,” said Marshall. “We hope to restore this powerful symbol of law, order and justice. We will actively work with our application of the law and other federal partners to restore this important mission.”
As a comparison, it is estimated that a new federal prison that would have 1,400 inmates in Letcher County, Kentucky, near the Virginia border, will cost more than $ 500 million.
Walter Pavlo, president of the Prisonology LLC consulting firm, whose experts include former BOP case and guards administrators, said he could easily see the price of the reconstruction of a prison in Alcatraz that exceeds that of Kentucky’s facilities. In addition, there are other costs associated with the operation of a maximum safety installation that requires state -of -the -art technology and infrastructure, particularly for a property that has had a long and colorful story of escape attempts.
Federal prisons are generally built in isolated and rural communities. Having one in the San Francisco Bay area, one of the most expensive places to live in the country, would also require competitive wages, Pavlo said. He said that these corrections officers and staff members should have experience in dealing with dangerous criminals.
The BOP currently houses such prisoners in its “Supermax” in Florence, Colorado, south of Colorado Springs.
Trump “wants an exhibition place for high profile criminals that people can see,” said Pavlo. “And there is no place of greater profile than Alcatraz.”
Some elected officials in California are minimizing Trump’s plan to turn Alcatraz into a prison.
“Now it is a very popular national park and a great tourist attraction,” said Representative Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., The former president of the Chamber, whose district includes the island, in X. “The president’s proposal is not serious.”
The idea began to take shape after Trump assumed the position for his second term. His son Donald Trump Jr. published in X that “Maybe we should also reopen Alcatraz?!?!” In response to his father’s preparations for an installation in the American military camp in the Bay of Guantanamo, Cuba, to house thousands of migrants.
In 1981, the Reagan Administration also examined Alcatraz as a place to keep the detainees fleeing Cuba through Mariel Boatlift, but the idea was rejected because the island did not have the appropriate resources and, by then, it was a magnet for tourists.
Alcatraz’s operations began in the mid -nineteenth century, first as a military fort to house prisoners, until the federal government transferred it to the Department of Justice. The federal prison opened in 1934. Over the years, Alcatraz, nicknamed The Rock, was dramatic escape scenario and a deadly siege by the inmates.
His purpose was “really a way of isolating inmates of news and society,” said Esslinger. “It was something like this iron curtain where information did not enter or came out.”
But ultimately, Alcatraz was not worth maintaining. In 1962, before the closing of the prison, the Bop determined that the salt air was severely running the building. Meanwhile, the lack of a wastewater system meant that wastewater was being thrown directly into the bay.
The island gained national attention in 1969 when a group of American native activists occupied it until 1971.
David Widner, whose uncles, the thieves of convicted banks John and Clarence Anglin, escaped from Alcatraz in 1962, said that given the tradition and public fascination of the island, “it would make sense that it remains as it is.”
“But I think Trump is able to change it? Of course,” Widner said. “With the correct type of money, it could be remaked.”
