NAMPA - Idaho officials are considering spending $500 million on a prison expansion and new state prison to alleviate the state's overcrowded facilities.
Corrections officials told state Board of Correction on Monday that the expansion is needed because all of Idaho's prisons are above capacity, county jails are packed and hundreds of Idaho inmates are being held temporarily at a private jail in Texas.
The Idaho Press reports the proposal also includes smaller expansions at an array of existing facilities.
The plan would add the 2,400 new prison beds the state is predicted to need by 2020.
Half of the Idaho inmates sentenced over the past year were convicted of drug offenses.
