THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, March 31, 1995 TAG: 9503290149
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JENNIFER C. O'DONNELL, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
When the staff of Hayes, Seay, Mattern and Mattern, a Virginia Beach architectural and planning firm, checked into their overnight accommodations last Friday they were pleased with the arrangements.
They had private rooms with a toilet and sink, steel showers, music, a very spacious dining area and plenty of security.
No, it wasn't the Holiday Inn. The crew was testing their newest construction project - the new juvenile detention home on Albemarle Drive in Chesapeake.
Employees of Hayes, Seay, Mattern and Mattern routinely spend a night or two in their newly finished buildings before they're officially opened. Their purpose is to put the project, in this case the Tidewater Juvenile Detention Home, through a series of overnight tests. In other words, a trial run.
``It's one of the last chances we'll have to make any adjustments or changes to the facility,'' said Steve Loomis, project architect. ``If we find any problems, we'll add it to our `punch list' and change it before the building is occupied.''
The ``punch list,'' a master list of all repairs or corrections that need to be made before the building can be occupied, range in severity from removing paint spots on the ceiling to replacing electrical wiring.
So last Friday the staff of the architectural firm and a few of their spouses packed their bags and prepared to rough it for the night. Once the group was in place, they set off on a thorough inspection of the premises. The building passed muster, with the exception of a few minor glitches.
One such glitch occurred when a member of the firm accidentally locked himself in one of the bathrooms. Normally, that wouldn't have been a problem but, minutes before, a colleague disengaged the computer lock override, a maneuver guards use to keep inmates in one area should trouble erupt.
Peter Soranidis, the project's engineer, freed his colleague by flipping a few switches at the detention home's high-tech, computerized control room. After a 30-minute delay, the bathroom door was functioning properly and the trapped engineer was free.
The architects, planners and engineers were looking for more than aesthetic or structural problems last Friday. They were also there to see what it's like to spend time in a detention home.
``If you want to see how it feels and what it's like, you have to experience it,'' said Lou Austin, a project engineer with the firm. ``That's the only way you can humanize a facility like this.''
And if you ask the employees of Hayes, Seay, Mattern and Mattern, they'll tell you they accomplished just that. The detention home looks like a typical high school, with concrete walls, tiled floors and blue-and-green horizontal stripes that look like school colors running throughout the interior.
The planners incorporated other comforts into the design as well, including a rubber-floored basketball court, an arts and crafts room and a weight room.
``The average stay here is 17 days,'' said Loomis, ``We wanted the detention center to be as comfortable, as normal, as possible.''
As comfortable as the facility might be, the planners didn't forget who they were dealing with. Thirty cameras are set up around the facility so guards can observe the activities from the bulletproof-glass encased control room. The security system alerts guards to potential problems and a graphic panel even illustrates which doors are sealed and which are not. ILLUSTRATION: Photos by GARY C. KNAPP
Steve Loomis, project architect, looks over the control center of
the juvenile detention home.
Lou Austin was trapped briefly in a shower room when the door
locked behind him.
by CNB