JPs hire adviser on jail finance
BOONEVILLE — The Logan County Quorum Court voted Monday to hire a Little Rock firm as bond counsel to advise the county on financing construction of a new county jail.
The nine justices of the peace present passed a resolution authorizing County Judge Ray Gack to negotiate a contract with the Little Rock law firm Friday, Eldredge and Clark to provide professional services as bond counsel for the Logan County detention center construction project.
Gack said the county has architectural plans for a jail that would hold up to 140 inmates and could cost about $ 10 million to build. But county officials said Monday they would prefer to build the jail to hold 100 inmates, the size that was
recommended in a study conducted for the county.
Justice of the Peace Ken Hart of New Blaine said a jail with a 100- inmate capacity would cost less than one holding 140 and would reduce the amount of taxes the county would have to ask voters to approve.
“I think we’re on the same page with that,” Gack said.
The Quorum Court agenda for Monday’s meeting had included a resolution to select the U. S. Department of Agriculture to provide financing for jail construction. The Quorum Court tabled the item until bond counsel has a chance to look over the county’s plans, advise officials and meet with the court’s jail committee on the best option to pay for the jail.
County officials have discussed a 1- percentage- point sales tax increase, doubling the current 1 percent county sales
tax, to pay for the project. If voters approved the tax increase, Gack said, half would be designated to pay for construction of the jail and would expire when the debt is paid off. The other half- percentage point increase in the sales tax would remain in place to generate revenue to pay jail maintenance and operating costs.
Gack said he hopes the county will be in position to put the tax question before voters in May or June.
“We’re very hopeful the people will get behind this, because my main concern is the safety of the employees and inmates,” Logan County Sheriff Boyd Hicks said Monday. “This facility is outdated and not a safe working environment.”
Hicks and Gack, who is a former Logan County sheriff, said the county is in desperate need of a new jail. The current jail, which opened in 1989, has a capacity for 34 inmates. Hicks said it’s common to have more than 40 incarcerated at a time.
The jail held 33 inmates Monday, Hicks said. He said he has kept the jail population low by releasing persons arrested on misdemeanors and nonviolent crimes. It has been difficult deciding whom to hold and whom to release, he said.
The state also has threatened to close the jail because of overcrowding and inadequate conditions, Hicks said.
He said that because of inadequate space, the sheriff’s office cannot comply with the law to separate felons from misdemeanor inmates, to separate adjudicated inmates from those awaiting trial and to isolate inmates with psychiatric needs.
Hicks said his office had more than 1,500 outstanding warrants to serve, and even arresting 10 percent of those would overwhelm the jail. He said he hoped a new jail with larger capacity would prompt people to pay their fines and not risk going to jail.
The proposal calls for a jail with four prisoner pods and a
central guard station where jailers could monitor inmates using video cameras, control panels to open and lock cells, and use a public address system to move inmates without coming into physical contact with them.
To provide for 100 inmates, one pod would be built but left unfinished until future needs call for more beds.
The sheriff’s office employs 12 full- and part- time jailers. Hicks said he is calculating how many additional jailers would be needed for the new jail and how much his operating and maintenance expenses would be.
County officials are considering building the new jail on eight acres of land the county owns just south of the Paris Police Department on the east end of Paris.