ST. GABRIEL — A newly constructed state prison opened its doors in St. Gabriel on Thursday. 

The $160 million facility, the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women, has 15 buildings spread across 300,000 square feet.

The Department of Public Safety and Corrections said the 958-bed facility includes spaces specifically designed to focus on providing rehabilitation, education, mental and medical healthcare, and post-partum treatment. 

"The Department takes the dignity, care and treatment of incarcerated women in its custody seriously," Warden Kristen Thomas said. "Today's grand opening reflects the culmination of many years of extensive work and a centralized new beginning for my staff, the women in our custody and the volunteers who dedicate their service." 

LCIW employs 261 state employees, including 58 health specialists, at the facility. 

The facility, located west of the Elayn Hunt Correction Center, was built over three years. 

The August 2016 flood inundated Elayn Hunt, prompting state prison officials to disperse its approximately 1,000 female prisoners to other facilities that included the men's unit at St. Gabriel and the former Jetson Center for Youth, an outdated site in Baker.

It wasn't until September 2022, more than six years after the flood, that the state broke ground on the new facility.

Part of the delay was blamed on the coronavirus, but the pandemic began nearly four years after devastating floods hit the region. Prior to the pandemic, the state was negotiating with federal officials over how much FEMA would contribute to either repairs or rebuilding. When the state determined that repairs would cover about the same cost as a full rebuild, it opted for a new facility.

At the time of the 2022 groundbreaking, FEMA had dedicated $44 million. State prison officials said the new facility was above the 500-year flood plain.