By GEORGE BOWLES

By GEORGE BOWLES

In theetiriy 1970s, as the conDiet in southeast Asia was winding down, Got. Lin wood Holton's abortive effort to bufld a major corrections fisdUty in the Green Springs District of Louise County wss often referred to «s "Holton’s Vietnam." The governor and the state were battled to a standstfll by a group of determined dtieene who were unwilling to see their historic region mured by the unsightly presence of the prison.

Now, in the mid-1980s, Gov. Chuck Robb also finds himself pestered by not one, but a whole host, of corrective problems. They are, to be sure, quite different from Holton’s. Yet because of their seemingly intractable nature some are already calling them "Robb’s Vietnam.”

Robb’s problems or, more accurately, its symptom—is the rash of breakouts and other incidents which have plagued the state’s penal system in recent months. They began with the escape of the six death-row inmates from the Mecklenburg Correction Center in May. Since then there has been an embarrassing number of other escapee, nprimigt «nH ilmilw OCCUTranees.

The flurry of incidents dearly caught the Robb administration off balance. The heavy emphasis - or at least lip service - which earlier admhdstrations had given to "law Vender” may have led to a false sense of security and a feeling {bat the system was in reasonably good working order.

Certainly it was recognised that problems existed. These inchided such hardy perennials aa facility overcrowding, understaffing, low guard pay and generally low morale at just about all levels of the Corrections Department. Theee, however, had been a part of the corrections landscape for yean, if not for decades.

The Robb administration may be fairly faulted far not taking more aggressive action to correct them, but it certainly did not originate them.

Indeed, what we are seeing are the large birds of those years of neglect coming home to roost. Unfortunately for Robb, they

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Up to now his reactions to the events lym been quintessentially Virginian. They have been conservation and understated, so much so that his usually more conservative critics are accusing him of inaction. To be sure, after each incident there has been a new burst of directives tightening prison, procedures, restricting inmate activities and attacking the symptoms generally. The basic causes, however, remain largely untouched.

After the Mecklenburg breakout a panel of members of the State Board of Corrections was appointed to study and make recommendations for improving security the facility. Their report contained strong criticisms of both the physical aspects of the center and the way in which it was being administered. So far the study has resulted in little action. The findings, we understand, have been taken under advisement.

On Oct 5, former Corrections Director Robert London submitted a 17 page memorandum to