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For decades, the California Rehabilitation Center (CRC) in Norco has been known for its deplorable conditions: extreme heat, pest infestations, unreliable programming, and water so unsafe that guards refuse to drink it. As residents of CRC, we experienced these conditions firsthand. So we celebrated when the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) announced in August 2025 that CRC had been named for closure. Almost one year later, as of July 29, 2026, CRC has officially been emptied. Today, the empty prison remains in “warm shutdown” mode, costing the state hundreds of millions of dollars.

The announcement of CRC Norco’s closure was a testament to years of community advocacy to reduce the imprisoned population, expose systemic issues in CRC that are reflective of those throughout the prison system, and highlight possibilities for non-carceral reinvestment in California’s Riverside County. Imprisoned people, loved ones, and advocates had exposed the toxicity in CRC for decades — leading to the prison being marked for closure in 2012 by the CDCR under then-Gov. Jerry Brown. In 2021, Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB) named CRC Norco as the top state prison to close based on a survey of more than 2,000 imprisoned people. We connected with CURB in 2024 to share testimony about CRC’s horrific conditions and failing infrastructure.

There is much to learn from looking back at CRC’s closure process. During its closure, imprisoned people in CRC Norco have been subjected to a gauntlet of unnecessary burdens and persecution, similar to those endured in prior closures. California needs to close more prisons — they cause more harm than they address while draining billions of dollars in resources from the communities that need them most. But we also can’t let the CDCR use closures as an excuse to punish imprisoned people with tumultuous transfers, denial of food and medicine, restricted access to rehabilitative programming, and retaliation. Releases, not chaotic transfers, must be the center of any future closure plan.

As CRC emptied out, one of us stayed behind while the other was transferred to another prison. From both sides of the closure process, we have seen the same pattern of preventable harm.

For those who remained inside CRC during the closure process, including college students finishing classes at Norco College or UC Riverside’s prison education program, conditions rapidly worsened. After the announcement of CRC’s closure, we were moved........

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