The closures are part of Perdue's effort to deal with declining sales and income taxes that have fallen below projections.

Officials, volunteers and inmates at the Guilford Correctional Center in McLeansville said closing the facility would be a huge loss.

Few people would heap praise upon a prison, but there's no shortage of people at the prison who say the worth of this minimum security facility goes far beyond its fences.

"I understand that there are tough choices to be made, but I just look at the choices," James Lacewell, the prison's superintendent, said. "I look at how it impacts the community where I live, where I work, and that's what concerns me."

Some 40 of the prison's 164 inmates are on work release, helping to support their families, putting money back into the community and developing self-esteem.

"It would be really hard for me to go to another camp to find a job with the economy like it is," inmate Travis Watkins said.

More than 200 people volunteer at the prison, building friendships and trust with inmates and teaching many of them new skills including training stray dogs.

"The program gives the guys hope," Frankie Heath, who runs A New Leash On Life, said. "It teaches the guys to work as a team. This is probably one of the first structured environments many of these guys have worked in."

Inmate Daniel Chrisco is one of Heath's trainers.

"The program is helping me to learn how to go back out into society and be a productive member of society," he said.

Many of the inmates said the nearness of this facility to their families is key to their rehabilitation.

"It's a short commute for my family," inmate Michael Scales said. "Being that I'm close to getting out now, it's just so easy for my mom to come see me. A big part of me being able to make it here is my family."

A corrections veteran, Lacewell said he's never formed an attachment to a particular prison, but this is one he hopes never goes away.

"It's going to be a real big negative impact and I should hope that the powers that be would consider that all the way," he said.

The Guilford Correctional Center opened in 1939. Perdue said closing the seven prisons would not reduce the total number of beds in the system and that inmates would be transferred to other facilities with available capacity.