Wapato Multnomah County Jail - St Johns, OR - Retired Prisons on Waymarking.com

With the 10th anniversary of Wapato’s completion fast approaching, current county officials, like those who preceded them, are left wondering what to do with a mothballed facility that costs taxpayers between $300,000 and $400,000 a year to maintain.

That means the county has spent about $3.5 million since Wapato was completed to keep it safely in mothballs. It’s been so long since the project was launched, in fact, that all of the bonds sold to finance the jail will be paid off by 2016 – possibly before it has ever housed a single inmate.

“The core issue is that a prior county board, in an ill-advised move, decided to build this facility when it wasn’t clear that it was needed or that we could afford to operate it,” board Chairman Jeff Cogen said. “Unfortunately, both turned out to be true.”

So, except for the few days each month when the 168,420-square-foot facility is taken over by film crews or inspected by county facilities crews, Wapato sits empty, a painful reminder that the best assumptions of well-intended people can sometimes fall flat.

Address: 14355 N. Bybee Lake Court Portland, OR Multnomah 97203 Open to the public: No Hours: Exterior only all hours Fees?: Not listed Web link: Not listed

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Date Logged Log   04/04/2018 3rd times the charm visited it 11/27/2013 dkestrel visited it 11/27/2013 DocDTA visited it

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