Property Owner Sues to Stop Country's Largest Prison Project

Hover and Indian Oaks residents want the new 884-cell men's correctional structure to be built in another part of Sumter County, away from nearby housing developments.

Bureau of Prison officials have told residents they need the new building to house 1,000 inmates that are part of the nation's prison over-population. Prison officials say they will plant trees and build berms to shield a portion of the new prison from the subdivision.

Hover's suit seeks an injunction that would immediately halt construction and allow residents and prison officials to confer on other possible construction sites. The suit alleges Bureau of Prison officials misled residents in 1992 by saying it would only build a single penitentiary and four low-security risk buildings on the Country Road 500 site.

When the new structure is completed in 2004, the total inmate population will be 5,895, almost double Coleman's permanent population of 3,876 residents. Sumter County's total population is 43,678 based on the 2000 Census. The federal government is the largest landowner in the county.

The existing $120 million prison was completed in 1995 by Bethesda, MD-based Clark Construction Co. and DLR Group of Phoenix. Clark expanded the complex in May 2001 to house another 1,000 inmates at a cost of $78 million. At a total $287 million, the three projects rank among the largest commercial/industrial undertakings in Central Florida over the past 10 years, according to GlobeSt.com research.

The Bureau of Prisons ranks the 4,698-inmate population in Beaumont, TX as the second largest structure of its kind. Close behind is the 4,669 inmate structure in Allenwood, PA.

The new Florida project comes as the Bureau of Prisons also starts work on a $200 million, twin penitentiary project at Salters, SC near Charlotte, and Bennettsville, SC near Myrtle Beach. Each pen will house 1,152 inmates.