DAYTON - The Dayton Human Rehabilitation Center, the Ohio city's 73-year-old jail for nonviolent offenders, will close Sept. 15, ending complaints about security and living conditions.

        Chief U.S. District Judge Walter Rice had repeatedly ruled that conditions at the workhouse were unconstitutional.

        The City Commission had decided in May to close the 414-bed jail this fall unless enough improvements were made. The jail, which has lost $9 million in the past five years, held only 19 prisoners as of Thursday.

        As part of a settlement in 2000 of a federal lawsuit over the jail conditions, administrators promised to improve medical care, clothing, meals, cleanliness and maintenance.

        The settlement also included goals to better respond to inmate complaints and improve work-release, education and training programs.

        Montgomery County Sheriff Dave Vore pulled the county's inmates from the center in February and began sending them to other jails.

        Until then, Montgomery County had been the center's largest paying customer, accounting for 56 percent of inmates since 1997.

        Sheriff Vore said the center didn't meet his standards for security and cleanliness.

        Dayton then tried to make up for the loss by accepting 150 Immigration and Naturalization Service prisoners.

        The INS would have paid $65 a day per prisoner. The county had paid $45 a day.

        Judge Rice blocked the INS from moving its prisoners to the workhouse because he was not satisfied conditions would be adequate and the INS would not promise monthly inspections.

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