AUGUSTA TRANSITIONAL CENTER
Facility Information
- Current Population
- 226
- Active Lifers
- 17 (7.5% of population) · Jun 2026 GDC report
- Address
- 601 Taylor Street, Augusta, GA 30901
- Phone
- (706) 721-1650
- Fax
- (706) 721-1798
- County
- Richmond County
- Operator
- GDC (Georgia Dept. of Corrections)
Leadership & Accountability (as of 2025 records)
Officials currently holding positional authority at this facility, with deaths attributed to GPS-tracked records during their leadership tenure. Inclusion reflects role-based accountability, not legal findings of personal culpability. Death counts shown as facility / career.
| Role | Name | Since | Deaths this facility / career |
|---|---|---|---|
| CORRECTIONAL SUPERINTENDENT (facility lead) | Harrison, Eugenia Darlene | 2020-01-01 | — / — |
| DEPUTY WARDEN (facility deputy) | Mahoney, Tamikia Nicole | 2025-01-01 | — / 26 |
| Assistant Superintendent (facility deputy) | Cliett, Asia Deon | 2024-10-16 | — / — |
About
Augusta Transitional Center is a 226-bed transitional facility at ASMP in Richmond County. GPS has tracked one in-custody death here; systemic GDC issues include staffing crises, sexual violence, and food-sanitation failures, though specific documentation is sparse.
Mortality Statistics
1 deaths documented at this facility from 2020 to present.
Deaths by Year
- 2026: 0
- 2025: 0
- 2024: 1
- 2023: 0
- 2022: 0
- 2021: 0
- 2020: 0
County Public Health Department
Food service and sanitation at AUGUSTA TRANSITIONAL CENTER fall under the jurisdiction of the Richmond County Environmental Health Department. Incarcerated people cannot choose where they eat — public health inspectors carry an elevated responsibility to hold this kitchen to the same standards applied to any restaurant.
Contact
- Title
- EH Specialist
- Name
- Derek Buzhardt
- Address
-
1916 North Leg Road, Bldg K
Augusta, GA 30909 - Phone
- (706) 667-4234
- Derek.Buzhardt@dph.ga.gov
- Website
- Visit department website →
Why this matters
GPS has documented black mold on chow-hall ceilings, cold and contaminated trays, spoiled milk, and pest contamination at Georgia prisons. The Department of Justice's 2024 report confirmed deaths from dehydration and untreated diabetes tied to food and water deprivation. Advance-notice inspections let facilities stage temporary fixes that disappear once inspectors leave.
Unannounced inspections by the county health department are one of the few outside checks on kitchen conditions behind the fence.
How you can help
Write to the county inspector and request an unannounced inspection of the kitchen and food service operation at this facility. A short, respectful letter citing Georgia food-safety regulations is more powerful than you think — inspectors respond to public concern.
Sample Letter
This is the letter Georgia Prisoners' Speak mailed to all county environmental health inspectors responsible for GDC facilities. Feel free to adapt it.
June 25, 2026
RE: Request for Unannounced Public Health Inspection of Food Service Operations at AUGUSTA TRANSITIONAL CENTER
Dear Derek Buzhardt,
I am writing to respectfully request that your office conduct a thorough, unannounced inspection of food service and sanitation practices at AUGUSTA TRANSITIONAL CENTER, located in Richmond County.
Documented concerns
Georgia Prisoners' Speak, a nonprofit public advocacy organization, has published extensive investigative reporting on food safety and nutrition failures across Georgia's prison system, including:
- Dangerous sanitation conditions — black mold on chow hall ceilings and air vents, contaminated food trays, and spoiled milk served to inmates.
- Severe nutritional deficiency — roughly 60 cents per meal; inmates receive only 40% of required protein and less than one serving of vegetables per day.
- Preventable deaths — the U.S. Department of Justice's 2024 report confirmed deaths from dehydration, renal failure, and untreated diabetes following food and water deprivation.
- Staged compliance — advance-notice inspections allow facilities to stage temporary improvements, then revert once inspectors leave.
Firsthand testimony
In Surviving on Scraps: Ten Years of Prison Food in Georgia, a person who has spent more than ten years in GDC custody describes no functional dishwashing sanitation, chronic mold on food trays, and roaches found on the undersides of trays at intake facilities. Full account: gps.press/surviving-on-scraps-ten-years-of-prison-food-in-georgia.
Specific requests
- Conduct an unannounced inspection of the kitchen and food service operations at this facility, with particular attention to dishwashing equipment, tray sanitation procedures, and food storage conditions.
- Evaluate compliance with applicable Georgia food safety regulations, including O.C.G.A. § 26-2-370 and the Georgia Food Service Rules and Regulations (Chapter 511-6-1).
- Verify permit status and confirm whether the facility is subject to the same inspection schedule as other institutional food service establishments in the county.
- Make inspection results available to the public, as permitted under Georgia's Open Records Act (O.C.G.A. § 50-18-70).
Incarcerated individuals cannot advocate for their own health and safety in the way a restaurant patron can — they cannot choose to eat elsewhere. This places an elevated responsibility on public health officials to ensure these facilities meet the same sanitation standards applied to any food service establishment.
Thank you for your attention to this important public health matter.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
Food Safety Inspections
No inspection records are on file with the Georgia Department of Public Health for this facility. GPS has filed an open records request asking where these records are maintained.
What the score doesn't measure. DPH grades kitchen compliance on inspection day — food storage, temperatures, pest control. It does not grade whether today's trays are clean. GPS reporting has found broken dishwashers at most Georgia state prisons we've documented; trays go out wet, stacked, and visibly moldy — including at facilities with recent scores near 100.
Who inspects. Most Georgia state prisons sit in rural counties — often with fewer than 20,000 people, several with fewer than 10,000. The environmental health inspector lives in that community and often knows the kitchen staff personally. Rural inspection regimes don't have the structural independence you'd expect in a city-sized health department. Read the scores accordingly.
Read the investigation: “Dunked, Stacked and Served: Why Georgia Prison Trays Are Making People Sick”
Analysis written on June 21, 2026.
The Augusta Transitional Center is a transitional facility located within the Augusta State Medical Prison (ASMP) complex in Richmond County, Georgia. Operated by the Georgia Department of Corrections, it houses approximately 226 individuals in a reentry-focused setting. Warden Eugenia Harrison oversees the facility, supported by Assistant Superintendent Asia Deon Cliett and Chief of Security Stacy Leslie. Despite its role in the state’s reentry infrastructure, Augusta Transitional Center has generated very little publicly available documentation — no news reports, no federal court filings, and only one recorded in-custody death in GPS’s tracking.
A Single Recorded Death
GPS’s mortality database records one death at Augusta Transitional Center. The circumstances and cause have not been disclosed in any public reporting or court document that GPS has been able to identify. The absence of detail is itself a gap; Georgia law does not require GDC to release cause-of-death information unless compelled by litigation or public records request, leaving many in-custody deaths unexplained.
Systemic Pressures Across Georgia Prisons
While Augusta Transitional Center has not been the subject of specific investigative reporting, the Georgia prison system as a whole is under extraordinary strain, and those pressures inevitably shape the environment at every facility. GPS reporting has documented classification drift across the system — medium-security facilities forced to operate as close-security due to overcrowding and understaffing — as well as officer vacancy rates averaging 50% statewide, with some facilities reaching 80%. The Department of Justice’s October 2024 findings letter concluded that GDC leadership had “lost control of its facilities,” faulting the agency for blaming gangs while ignoring catastrophic understaffing. GPS’s own systemic analysis has linked staffing collapse to gang control, infrastructure decay, and violence. Additionally, GPS has documented systemic food-sanitation failures, with per-meal spending under 60 cents, chronic vermin infestation, and dishwashers that cannot sanitize — conditions corroborated by The Marshall Project in May 2026.
Sexual Violence and Staffing Collapse
The DOJ found that sexual assault is “rampant” in Georgia prisons, with only 7.7% of allegations substantiated. GPS’s reporting has identified multiple clusters of staff-on-inmate sexual abuse at women’s facilities and systemic failure to meet PREA standards. While such patterns have been concentrated in maximum-security and large state prisons, the underlying conditions — severe understaffing, inadequate training, and a hiring pipeline that fails to replace departing officers — affect all GDC facilities. The hiring acceptance rate is under 15%, and over 80% of new hires leave within their first year, ranking Georgia last in correctional officer pay.
Sparse Transparency at Transitional Centers
Transitional centers, because they house people approaching release and often have work-release programs, tend to receive less scrutiny than high-security prisons. The Augusta facility’s population of 226 represents a small fraction of the state’s nearly 50,000 incarcerated individuals and roughly 2,800 in transitional centers system-wide, according to GDC’s June 2026 population snapshot. No news articles in GPS’s archive mention Augusta Transitional Center by name, and no lawsuits or health inspections specific to the facility have surfaced. The one death recorded by GPS remains entirely opaque.
Augusta Transitional Center exemplifies the information vacuum that surrounds many of Georgia’s smaller correctional facilities. Without investigative reporting, litigation, or robust disclosure from GDC, even basic facts about safety, conditions, and mortality remain hidden. GPS will continue to track this facility as new information emerges.
Sources
This analysis draws on GPS’s own systemic findings regarding classification drift, staffing collapses, food-sanitation failures, and systemic sexual violence across Georgia prisons; the U.S. Department of Justice’s October 2024 findings letter; The Marshall Project’s May 2026 investigation of Georgia prison food; GDC population statistics; and GPS’s internal mortality-tracking database.