Diary of a Prison Architect – Day 3, Prison Labour

Dear Diary,

We received our second batch of prisoners this morning which brings us to a total of 16 inmates. Along with our new guests we have also employed an additional two guards and construction of a 16 person cell block has almost been completed.

Right now the cell block has only one door at the entrance with all the cells open to a central corridor. This could be a major issue if the prisoners get too rowdy so we should aim to finish this block completely before we accept more men.

The prisoners are just finishing up their breakfasts now and there is a lot of grumbling. The Chief has given the prison a four exclamation point danger rating right now so we have scheduled free time for most of the door. Once things calm down we can think about setting up a workshop so that we can employ these men and bring in some extra profits.

The free time is already lightening the men’s spirits. It could be risky but I’m going to send in the workmen now to complete the cell doors and walls.

The Security Chief has finished drawing up the plans for our guard deployment and patrols. With a bigger budget we could bring in even more guards which would mean less reliance on roaming patrols. Things have really calmed down a lot since this morning so I guess it’s time to start working on a workshop for the men.

Christopher Paton (pleaded not guilty to manslaughter) has been complaining loudly about his dirty clothing, a complaint that will no doubt spread to the other men. The Foreman tells me that we could in fact employ our prisoners in a prison laundry. I’ll have the workmen start on it as soon as they have finished the workshop.

We’ve also had visitation requests from the family members of some of our guests. This would be far too dangerous without a dedicated facility so I’ve had to decline them for now, they will have to make do with the phones in the yard and common room.

The workshop is ready for use and the laundry is under construction. We will add more machines in the workshop later, I think it’s best to run this program as a trial for now, I have no idea how the prisoners will react to being put to work.

Something I’ve noticed is that the prison is getting very dirty. I may be able to put the prisoners to work cleaning later but for now I’m going to have the Foreman hire some janitors.

The Warden scheduled a couple of hours of work time this evening. This sheet metal will be turned into license plates in no time. It looks rather dangerous in there so I’ll speak to the Chief about assigning a guard here. We’ll ship the goods out at midnight and then we’ll have a better idea of how the workshop is going to affect our budget.

Time for me to pop out for some dinner. It was a stressful start to the day. Let’s hope there are no incident reports when I return.