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First meeting to discuss new jail draws questions
Bourbon County Sheriff Bill Martin is on a mission to get information about the safety and efficiency issues of the current jail, built in 1977, to the public.
A panel of Bourbon County public safety employees, along with a representative from Goldberg Group Architects, PC of St. Joseph, Mo., spoke to a group of approximately 20 concerned citizens about construction of a proposed new jail Thursday evening at Uniontown High School.
"We (the current jail facility) don't meet standards. We are here to discuss and we are willing to talk to anybody about it," Martin said in his introduction to the crowd.
Prior feasibility study
The feasibility study, which was completed in December 2011, was presented by Artie Lucas of Goldberg Group.
The proposed facility would be a 110bed jail, costing more than $6 million dollars, Lucas said.
Lucas handed out a schematic diagram of the 23,500 square foot new facility, with a control room that has a visual line of sight into all areas of the facility.
Current jail's problems
"The current jail facility has a linear design -- a hallway with cells on both sides. This dramatically decreases the corrections officer's line of sight in seeing all the inmates in their cells," Lucas said.
Lucas said there is a law, called the Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 designed to protect inmates from being preyed upon by other inmates or staff.
"The jail is one of the three areas of greatest liability in a county, along with vehicles and roads and bridges," he said.
Currently the facility houses 30 to 50 people.
"Our jail was built for 27 inmates...we usually double that population," Martin said.
There are 37 classes of inmates, with administration given the responsibility of where to put each. A person incarcerated for writing a bad check should not be housed with a murder suspect, he said.
New jail
A new jail could be run with less employees, which could be a savings and but there are other potential revenues for the new facility, Lucas said.
"Fifty-one beds (can) house inmates from other jurisdictions. Currently you are housing inmates in other jurisdictions," he said.
County prisoners from outside of Bourbon County could be charged $40 to $45 a day, thus creating a revenue for the jail.
Bringing out-of-county inmates to new jail
Bourbon County Commissioner Allen Warren, who attended the meeting, spoke about Allen County's dilemma of taking out-of-county inmates.
"I talked with Allen County's ex-sheriff and a county commissioner,"
Warren said. "Allen County said they experienced families (of inmates) coming to Allen County, getting on Allen County social services. Therefore they do not bring anyone from Wyandotte County to Allen County jail. They are faced with a jail payment they are having a tough time making, and they are begging us to take prisoners."
"I talked to Brian Murphy, sheriff of Allen County, he hasn't seen any type of criminal activity because of housing inmates," Martin said.
Lucas and Martin said there are options in the decisions of which inmates would be received by Bourbon County.
Public questions
Randy Rockhold, a concerned citizen, asked how much Bourbon County spent on sending inmates to other facilities.
Jail Administrator Bobby Reed's answer was "$164,260"
"You can either send your inmates somewhere else and pay for their jail or have some inmates come into your facility and let those jurisdictions pay for your jail," Lucas said. "There is a potential there without a tax increase."
Rhonda Dunn, another concerned citizen, asked if there is a plan for the old jail facility.
"We are not that far down the road yet," Lucas said.
"Offsite, are the judges going to be OK with video conferencing? Are we going to have enough manpower to take back and forth?" Heather Russell, a concerned citizen asked.
"A lot of them wanted to have video arraignment, if there is a video system that is working properly," Martin said. "That eliminates some of the transportation issues."
Russell also asked if there are any federal grants available for the jail. Lucas said there are grants through the State Emergency Management Agency (SEMA) that would fund safe rooms or an emergency operations center
"It would be a good time to submit something like that," Lucas said.
"It sounds like you are convinced that this is going to be a profitable thing. Are there any company's that will back it up as grantors?" Rockhold asked. "It has to be cost effective...it all has to balance."
Before Lucas could answer, Warren asked, "Are there any privatized jails?"
"Not really," Lucas replied.
"When our jail was built in 1977, we had the same types of crime, but not the numbers of crimes," Reed said. "Our crime rate has jumped tremendously in the last 30 years. Our jail will populate at a faster rate."
"People need to know all the information. At least you'll have the factual info to talk about," Lucas said. "It's an option available...without a tax increase."
"We see what they are talking about. It's can we, as a county, afford it," Warren said.
"I believe we can do it," Martin said.
Next meeting
On Friday, Martin told the Tribune he has invited Sheriff Murphy to come to the next community input meeting to address concerns brought out at Thursday night's meeting.
The next community meeting is Thursday, Feb. 6 at the Ellis Fine Art Center at Fort Scott Community College.
Murphy will address issues Allen County has seen of housing inmates, specifically families of inmates moving in, if there has been increased criminal activity and finding inmates to house, Martin said. The Allen County jail facility was built in 2005.