The Connecticut Department of Correction (DOC) will be closing one of the 10 housing units at the Manson Youth Institution in Cheshire, according to a statement from Gov. Dannel P. Malloy. The unit closure will save the state more than $600,000 in annual operating costs.

The closures are a result of the state’s recently enacted juvenile justice reforms and the continuing decline in the crime rate and prison population, according to Malloy.

“Juvenile justice reform is about recognizing that our young people need a system based on help and support instead of one based on isolation and permanent punishment,” Malloy said in a statement. “In Connecticut, we’ve taken a reform-focused and data-driven approach that has brought our prison population to its lowest point in 23 years, while bringing our crime rate down to a remarkable 50-year low. In this same time span, we’ve reduced juvenile arrests by more than 5,000, allowing us to offer our young people classrooms instead of prison cells and opportunity instead of incarceration.”

Connecticut has seen a steady decline in the number of inmates under the age of 22 as a result of the recently enacted Raise the Age reforms. Since 2009, the number of inmates in DOC custody between the ages of 18 and 21 has dropped by 62 percent.

The Manson Youth Institution, which is currently housing 490 inmates, is a level four, high-security facility that houses both sentenced and un-sentenced male young adults under the age of 22, including approximately 50 15 to 17-year-olds who have been transferred from juvenile to adult court.

The closure of the unit comes on the heels of several other facility closures throughout the state prison system in recent years, including:

• The upcoming closure of the Enfield Corrections Institution at a savings of $6.5 million per year.
• The Radgowski Annex Building at the Corrigan-Radgowski Correctional Center in Montville in April 2017 at savings of $3 million per year.
• Four housing units within the Osborn Correctional Institution in October 2016 at a savings of $2.2 million per year.
• The Niantic Annex of the York Correctional Institution in January 2016 at a savings of $7.6 million per year.
• The Fairmont building at the Bridgeport Correctional Center in July 2015 at a savings of $2.1 million per year.
• The Bergin Correctional Institution in Storrs in August 2011 at a savings of $12 million per year.
• The Gates Correctional Institution in Niantic in June 2011 at a savings of $12.3 million per year.
• The Webster Correctional Institution in Cheshire in January 2010 at a savings of $3.4 million per year.