Earlier this month, activists began a new stand to stop the construction of a new juvenile justice facility and detention center at 12th and Alder. Here is a look inside Ending the Prison Industrial Complex’s appeal with the city’s Hearing Examiner asking for exceptions made in permits issued by the city to be overturned.

“They shouldn’t have gotten the variances,” Knoll Lowney, attorney for EPIC tells CHS.

The new facility is slated to go on the same campus along 12th Ave about a block south of the Seattle University campus. King County has been looking to replace the courthouse and administrative buildings for years. That buildings on the site was constructed in 1951, with an addition in 1972 that also renovated the 1951 building. The recession of 2008 held up plans for the expensive project, but in 2012, the county put a measure up before voters. In addition to the courtrooms and offices, the county included the youth detention facility, which was built in 1992, though EPIC disputes the ballot language was clear about the detention facility being part of the plan. Continue reading →