The DeKalb County Commission’s Jail Committee met last week despite the Budget Committee’s failure, for the second consecutive week, to move forward with a bond resolution needed to fund a proposed judicial center. The commission has voted to move ahead with building a new judicial center, and has approved preliminary designs for the project, but the bond issue and the accompanying property tax rate increase needed to fund the development, is still in the air. Twice the budget committee has voted down a bond resolution, not to exceed $65 million to fund a judicial center with housing for 190 inmates at a tax levy to be determined prior to passage of the 2024-25 budget.
That, coupled with where the facility will be located seems to be giving some commissioners second thoughts on how the county should move forward. With some public outcry seemingly increasing, the county decided to go ahead with the Jail Committee meeting, held on May 20, in order to give the public information on where the county stands with the facility. Several members of the public were on hand at the meeting to listen to what the commission had to say and to ask questions.
During the meeting, Sheriff Patrick Ray gave an update on the number of inmates currently housed in the jail, as well as prisoners being held in other counties, along with the cost to the county. According to Ray, those costs have grown to almost $100,000.
“We have a total of 43 inmates in jail. That’s 41 men and two women,” Sheriff Ray explained. “Last week we sent quite a few inmates to the state pen. That’s why our numbers are a little bit down this month. We are housing nine men and 11 women in other jails.”
“From about August 2023 is when TCI came and reduced our bed count down from 102 to 52 inmates. We have paid out $97,640 as of today. We should be at 88.56 percent of our budget in the jail, but we are at 84.52 percent. The major expense is housing of the inmates and we are under budget everywhere else but there. Hopefully, we can come out of this budget year without spending a whole lot on inmate housing in other counties but that will not happen next year because this year our expenses for housing inmates elsewhere went from September, 2023 to the present. Next year our costs will be from July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2025, so we will definitely go over budget,” Sheriff Ray said.
Afterwards, County Mayor Adcock told those in attendance where the county is so far as to the jail issue. “TCI contacted us and said we had to get under a plan of action to prevent the jail from being decertified due to the conditions of the jail. Those conditions were everything from ceiling heights, to sprinkler systems, to not enough adequate natural light into the cells and many other regulations. They shut down 50 of our beds. We had 102 beds and now have 52 beds.”
“We have tried to get all the female inmates out of the county. After being put on a plan of action that was approved by TCI, our jail committee met in February 2023 and began discussing the pros and cons of jails and justice centers. Our first course of action was trying to manipulate the building to keep using it, but in conversations with TCI they said there was no way to do that to house inmates here,” Adcock explained.
“We looked at building on the back portion of the jail to make an extension back there. We thought that was an easy fix to build what we needed that would be adequate. But there is a natural waterway and flood zone that runs along the back side of that parking lot and we were told that nothing could be built over that. We then looked at building off to the left, but there wasn’t a whole lot of room there.”
“We did come up with a scenario in which we could build off to the side and then tear down the old portion and build the sheriff’s office there. One issue with that scenario was the building would be on the property line of another property owner, which I have heard is now willing to sell for $700,000 for the 0.2 acres they own,” Mayor Adcock said.
“In construction, that would be a four-story building, but the construction management service representative told me he wasn’t comfortable with this option because a portion of the public square would have to be shut down for up to two years and a crane would be very close to other buildings in town which is very dangerous so protective measures would be needed,” he said.
“If we had to shut down a portion of the public square, based on the assessment done for building a new facility on the current site, there could be no Jamboree and a disruption for businesses around the courthouse for up to two years, “said Commissioner Tom Chandler. “Maybe it’s not for the full two years but if that assessment is accurate, we had better stop and think really hard about what that means,” he said.
Mayor Adcock then explained how the commission came to approve moving forward with a judicial center design. “The initial cost of the justice center was more than a jail. However, when you look at a 30-year bond period, what expenses would we acquire over that 30-year period. If we build a jail on another site, we will have to buy a bus, which is over $100,000, and bear the costs of fuel, maintenance of vehicles, officers, the person driving the bus, and the transport officer salaries, which are all recurring expenditures. By the time we added all that up, the estimate of the jail only project was more costly over 30 years than a judicial center,” said County Mayor Adcock.
Adcock then addressed questions as to whether the county jail has to be certified. The answer was no, but that would come with significant risk to the county. He used an example of a recent case in Knox County. “If our facility is decertified, we could bring all our prisoners back and house them here. However, if someone is injured and they have an attorney, they can come into court and allege our decertified jail is cruel and unusual punishment,” said Adcock.
According to Adcock a decertified Knox County jail was sued with a judge imposing a $5,000 per day fine on the county until a new jail facility was built.
Some commissioners seem to still be on the fence about building a judicial center, and building at a new location. Some are asking why just a simple jail can’t be built on the existing site, utilizing the existing buildings the county has now.
Commissioner Tom Chandler suggested that the county revisit building a new jail at the current location, and repurposing the current jail annex into courtrooms. “We could go and look at what it would cost us to turn that annex into a courtroom because it will have no value in my opinion after the new jail is built. The sheriff’s office is already there. It would stay there, and you would have a new jail next to the existing facility,” said Commissioner Chandler.
Commissioner Myron Rhody stated that he is apposed to a judicial center and building at a new location. “I am going to be for putting about 150 beds in our current location and using our courthouse and the jail annex because it is the place where we intake prisoners. We take then in through the sally port. We do the booking and fingerprinting, and we have 40 beds already there that I can’t see walking away from and if the natural lighting and overcrowding is the biggest problem we have then we need to work on the lighting because if we build a facility that will take care of the overcrowding,” said Rhody.
Commissioner Beth Pafford said she also preferred building a jail, but with fewer than 190 beds and space for inmate rehabilitation programs. “I for one would like to see what a jail for maybe 120 or 150 beds would look like. I think 190 beds is too many. In looking at the (CTAS Jail Assessment) report (compiled by Jim Hart, Jail Consultant and Field Manager of the County Technical Assistance Service (CTAS), a majority of the inmates are on pre-trial motions who have not even been to court yet. But the big thing that jumped out to me is that 70.98 percent of the inmates there are staying between one and seven days and more than three quarters of the inmates are staying two weeks or less. We will take care of our people, but we also need to make sure we have program space in the new jail,” said Commissioner Pafford.
Commissioner Greg Matthews said he disagreed. “We have completely gone away from all the numbers of inmates we had prior to COVID and that makes no sense to me. Before that the sheriff was averaging about 180 inmates, but now we’re talking about building a 150-bed jail. We are at lower numbers now, but sooner or later, judges are going to start sending people back to jail,” said Commissioner Matthews.
During the public comments, local resident Steven Cantrell asked the committee to reconsider the jail only option at the existing jail site. “I’m still in strong favor of a new county jail verses a justice center,” said Cantrell. “The facts are that a new jail is required. The current one is too small and does not meet state requirements. The earlier conclusion that a jail could not be built on the current site was wrong. In addition, at that time the adjoining land was not available for purchase. Based on the now erroneous conclusion that the jail would need to be built somewhere else other than across the street from the courthouse, a decision was made to pursue a justice center. There is no state requirement for a justice center.”
Sammie Maxwell addressed the meeting saying that she was a 30-year auditor for the State Comptroller of the Treasury Office now retired. “We have to be extremely careful how we allocate those dollars to our current needs. From my personal knowledge and experience, I feel like we have quite a few areas we can compromise on. For my part, I recommend that we not exceed 170 beds at our new facility, whatever that may be. If we deem we need an addition to the jail we should try to use an existing facility and reconfigure it to include perhaps some courtroom space,” said Maxwell.
Former commissioner Jerry Adcock said that the county could take the veterans building if room is needed at the current location. “Do away with that and build whatever you want to in that area and connect it to the new section of the jail. That would be a lot cheaper. I was told that if someone lives in the county and has a $160,000 house that property taxes on that house would be about $260 more than what it is right now if you do a 54-cent property tax increase. Think about that little old lady that lives out there making $1,300 per month on social security and other people out there,” said Adcock.
Elisha Orchard said she was concerned about a possible new location, and asked the committee to not build a judicial center near a residential area. “One of the biggest concerns for me and my family is the proposed locations for this monstrosity you want to build. One is directly behind where I live, and the other is directly behind where my parents live. We are in a very residential area a little bit off the square and there is nothing around us but families with very small children and I personally do not want inmates living in my back yard. Not only that but my property value would greatly decrease. If you go to a completely new place and break ground it needs to be taken into consideration how that is going to affect our community and the people who are paying the property tax increase to build this thing,” said Orchard.
Darcie Cripps also addressed the committee asking the county to simply add to the existing site. “Any of you that has ever built a house, or lived on a budget, knows that if you are told it’s going to cost you $10 by the time they are finished its going to cost you $15. If you don’t budget for that fifteen, what do you do? You break into another fund and try to make it work. We are looking at close to $100 million. To me the most feasible thing to do would be to pursue building on site and then plan for something ten or fifteen years down the road when the school is paid off or the roads are fixed.”
The Budget Committee and the Jail Committee will need to make some tough decisions soon in order to include a proposed property tax increase into the 2024-25 fiscal budget Local resident Steven Cantrell asked the committee to reconsider the jail only option at the existing jail site.
