Juvenile delinquents have moved out, and Sacramento State faculty and staff are about to move in.

Well … kind of.

Although Sacramento State President Alexander Gonzalez said the university has an exciting plan to construct a “university village,” for educators here, and salvaging a former California Youth Authority correctional facility, the plan is still not finalized.

“We don’t know the definite outcome,” said Ann Reed, associate vice president of public affairs.

The state has a program that allows California state agencies to reutilize old or closed state surplus property, for a predetermined service and for a handling fee, according to the Department of General Services.

The property will be freely handed over to Sac State.

If the plan succeeds, the 23 acres by Folsom Boulevard will first be used for auxiliary parking as construction begins on a new parking structure in the fall, then transformed into a faculty/staff housing facility with daycare, Reed said.

The facility closed down this year on March 1, because of budgetary constraints and an overall decrease in the number of youth detainees in California, said Sarah Ludeman, a California Youth Authority information officer.

Immediately after it closed, Sac State put in a request for a land and deed transfer with the state Department of General Services, and Sac State has been waiting since, Reed said.

According to Sac State officials, the Department of General Services will make a decision within the next few weeks.

Reed said that in many instances, it’s too expensive to move from out of state, so the overall goal is to give staff and faculty an option for affording housing here.

“There was a survey and both child care and the cost of housing were cited among the top desires,” Reed said in an email.

Independent from the survey cited by Reed, an online institutional research survey done by Sac State showed only 9 percent of faculty and staff said they would be interested in long term on-campus housing, if it were available.

Additionally, in the survey summary, faculty and staff have hardly considered leaving Sac State because of housing issues.

However, according to the survey, if faculty and staff had difficulties finding housing, nearly 80 percent said that cost was a factor and 68 percent said availability was a factor.

“As housing in this area becomes more and more expensive, this project will be a major factor that will help us in our recruiting efforts,” Gonzalez said.

In the survey, 37 percent of Sac State professors said that if on-campus housing were available at the time they were hired, they would have moved in. Reed said that the price tag for the housing complex is unknown.