VISTA — The San Diego County Sheriff’s Office held a workshop at the Vista Civic Center on Tuesday to share more information about the planned rebuild of the Vista Detention Facility and gather input from community members.
Constructed in 1978, the Vista jail along Melrose Drive is the oldest of the county’s seven detention facilities. An outside consultant determined last year that the jail has reached the end of its usable life and will need to be replaced, at an estimated cost of nearly $1 billion.
The new jail would increase the inmate capacity from 807 to 1,412, and would include new intake and release facilities, food services, medical and educational facilities, rehabilitation, indoor recreation, and security and staff areas.
On Tuesday, Sheriff Kelly Martinez and other officials discussed the needs of the current facility and the programs that could be implemented once it’s rebuilt, and gave community members the chance to provide feedback.
Martinez emphasized that the Vista jail was originally built with the goal of simply warehousing inmates, not providing mental health and re-entry services. By today’s standards, it is not a place people should be living long-term, yet it’s not uncommon for inmates to be housed there for three to five years.
“The reality is, Vista jail is no place to live for that length of time,” Martinez said. “We’ve shut down one of the housing modules because we can no longer find the parts for it. We’re literally ordering parts on eBay, and trying to find pieces to keep the jail running. The sewage backs up frequently, and there are all kinds of other infrastructure problems, and the spaces in the jail just aren’t conducive to the work that we need to do.”
Community members heard from a panel of individuals working at the Vista jail, including deputies, re-entry and medical staff, the Oceanside Police Chief, and a man who was formerly incarcerated there.
Re-entry and medical staff at the Vista jail said that, while they make do with the current infrastructure, they cannot provide the privacy and care people need.
Director of Nursing Cristina Clonts said there are no appropriate clinical spaces for initial health or psychiatric evaluations at intake, and individuals must be moved to other areas to complete this process.
“This is our first opportunity to maybe help a mental health crisis or get those care plans started,” Clonts said. “Right now, those evaluations do happen, but it does require some security and logistical movement, because there are no clinical spaces that are available in the intake area of those facilities at Vista.”
Re-Entry Program Coordinator Michael Barragan said a proper environment is crucial to the goal of re-entry services, which provide programs like skill-building, substance use treatment, and education to prepare inmates for success after their release.
“When it comes to re-entry planning, those conversations require a lot of honesty,” Barragan said. “They require a space where there’s confidential information that’s shared, so having those spaces that promote those change talks, having those spaces that promote individuals to better prepare while they’re in custody … it is vital to helping the individuals while they’re in custody.”
Oceanside Police Chief Taurino Valdovinos said the limitations of the Vista jail also pull deputies out of the field for too long while they book people into the jail.
During booking, if someone shows signs of high blood pressure, for example, they must be transported to a local hospital for a full assessment before they can be booked, which requires even more time from deputies.
Sometimes, deputies end up citing and releasing people, either in hospital beds or in front of the jail, simply because it will take too long to fully book them, officials said.
Jeffrey Warren, who was formerly incarcerated at the Vista jail and went through medically-assisted treatment, said the program helped him to turn his life around after years of dealing with addiction.
He said the staff did the best they could with the limited space they had, such as holding meetings in cleaned-out broom closets, and that they deserve proper facilities.
“It was like turning on a light in a dark room,” Warren said of the program. “It’s almost like a no-brainer, if you’re gonna make it, make it right, make it good, continue with the work, the good work, that’s been going on.”
Local advocates and family members of those who have died in San Diego County custody emphasized that while a new building is needed, it won’t fix all of the issues in the jails.
In 2022, the county had one of the highest in-custody death rates in the state, with 19 total deaths. Since then, the county reported 14 deaths in 2023, nine in 2024 (although community members say the true number is 10, counting one individual who was beaten into a coma in his cell in late 2023 and died the following year), and 10 in 2025.
Paloma Serna, whose daughter Elisa Serna died in the sheriff’s custody in 2019 after failing to receive medical treatment for withdrawal symptoms, said the more important change needs to happen among the people working in the jails.
“We can make a building beautiful and have all the updated digital stuff, but what are we going to do? … How do you get the staff with nursing, or even deputies, or other individuals who are incarcerated, to really participate and have compassion, pretty much, to help individuals to be successful from day one?” Serna asked.
Martinez thanked Serna and other advocates for helping drive the change that improved safety in the jails, and said the county works to instill in deputies and jail staff that the people in the jails are, first and foremost, members of the community.
Next steps
The road to the new jail will likely take several years, as the county is still early in the environmental review process. Over the next two years, the county will complete the environmental impact report for the project, which would then go to the County Board of Supervisors for approval.
There is no funding identified for the project at this point, but the county is planning to pursue funding through the capital improvement needs assessment process.
Once funding is approved, the county will proceed with preconstruction planning and design. County Project Manager Marcus Lubich said there will be multiple design options prepared for the new jail, and various opportunities for additional feedback.
