One of the state's largest prisons must close by 2029, but it's not closed yet.

Minnesota Correctional Facility - Stillwater's staff and population have been cut in half in the last year, but the campus remains a hub of activity as both offenders and corrections officers test new programs and initiatives, including Earned Living Units (ELUs).

"I would say this was a place of despair and a hopeless place and now it's a place of hope and a place of change," Lt. Sam Marks, a 20+ year veteran officer for the Minnesota Department of Corrections, told WCCO News. "I see these changes every day just in the dynamics in the way we're talking to each other."

Inside B East, inmates were seen working out on new gym equipment, tending to an indoor garden and even baking cookies. The inmates can only

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