The court-appointed receiver overseeing California's prison health care system said Friday the state must keep its promise to spend more than $2 billion for new medical facilities before the federal courts can end an oversight role that has lasted six years.

California has committed to spending $750 million to upgrade existing medical facilities, building a new medical center and converting juvenile lockups. So far, only the new medical center in Stockton is being built.

Receiver J. Clark Kelso told The Associated Press that the state must begin all the upgrades before it should be allowed to retake control of a prison medical system once deemed so poor that it was found to have violated inmates' constitutional rights. They are his first public comments since a federal judge last week told officials to begin preparing for an end to the receivership...

Indeed, Bob Sillen made strides during the 18 months he was in place, but he said it was at least a 10-year process and that change would not come cheaply. Unfortunately, it wasn't until a state audit was published last week, shortly after Mr. Sillen's dismissal from office, that it became clear just how much taxpayers were shelling out for those services.

His salary was public record from the beginning. Most Californians would be happy to earn in one year the $52,000 he earned monthly. Still, if you get what you pay for, the cost could be justified, because he was saving California millions. Right? […] Still, it is disappointing that Mr. Sillen has been unavailable for comment since the audit was released. He was never at a loss for words before. He owes the public an explanation and an apology.

The removal of Robert Sillen as the federal court-ordered prison health care receiver bodes well for negotiations with the three-judge panel currently considering releasing thousands of inmates. His removal will only benefit all stakeholders who are working together to keep inmates off the street while creating a constitutional level of health care. The prison health care receiver and the three-judge panel are separate, but intertwined, legal actions. U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson, who created the receivership, also sits on the three-judge panel…

A federal judge Wednesday abruptly fired the man he had appointed to fix the multimillion-dollar problems of medical care in the state's prisons, after determining the effort was moving too slowly and in too confrontational a manner. […] In an interview Wednesday, Kelso said Sillen had created a set of plans "that were so voluminous that it was very difficult for people to get their arms around them." He said he would craft a "strategic business plan" in an effort to return prison medical care to state control within four years…

U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson on Wednesday removed Robert Sillen as the federal receiver who oversees medical care for California's prison system. Sillen will be replaced by McGeorge School of Law professor J. Clark Kelso. In his seven-page order, Henderson said the receivership needs to move from what has been primarily "an investigative and evaluative phase" toward a system that "must ultimately be transitioned back to the state of California's control…