Oklahoma Department of Corrections (ODOC) announces plans to close the William S. Key Correctional Center (WKCC), a minimum-security prison located in Ft. Supply. The facility will close by year’s end.
“The decision to close a facility is always a difficult one,” said Director Scott Crow. “However, in order to assure the safety of our staff and inmates and act as proper stewards of the taxpayer funds we are entrusted with, this decision had to be made.”
The closure comes at the end of a long review process. Repair and operation costs of the more than 50 year-old facility have continued to increase over the years. The inmate housing units, constructed in 1947 and 1951, were not originally built to prison specifications. ODOC determined that maintaining the infrastructure is untenable, to the degree necessary for safety.
ODOC will work to address the needs of each of the 140 WKCC employees during the transition. The agency will transfer the approximately 1,000 inmates currently housed at the facility to other minimum security units.