TECUMSEH – State dignitaries and officials with the Oklahoma Office of Juvenile Affairs (OJA) broke ground on the first phase of a project to build a state-of-the art therapeutic campus for young people requiring secure-care treatment.

The campus will be built on the grounds of the Central Oklahoma Juvenile Center. Campus buildings will be refurbished and new residential cottages will be built. The project will be undertaken in stages, with final work to be completed by the end of 2020.

When the project is completed, the Tecumseh campus will serve as the single secure-care facility operated by OJA. Girls from an 18-bed Norman center were transferred to the Tecumseh campus in August. Boys in the 60-bed Southwest Oklahoma Juvenile Center in Manitou will eventually be transferred to the Tecumseh campus.

Plans are to build up to nine 16-bed cottages that will provide new living quarters for all the residents. OJA has the flexibility to scale back the project if the number of juveniles coming into the system continues to decline as it has in recent years.

In 2017, lawmakers approved legislation authorizing up to $45 million in bonds to help the agency consolidate its secure-care operations in an updated facility in Tecumseh. The agency is funding the project with money that it has saved through efficiencies.

The OJA board earlier this year approved $2.65 million in initial funding to prepare for the construction of the campus and to start work on support projects.