Expansion of jail sought by Baxter County sheriff

A sheriff who once cut out steel beds from his jail to curb overcrowding and rising expenses is asking the county to consider expanding the jail.

Baxter County Sheriff John Montgomery and members of the Quorum Court will host a public meeting this morning at the courthouse in Mountain Home to unveil a proposal to build a section onto the jail that would house at least 50 beds.

The jail, which currently has 101 beds, has been at capacity or near capacity for the past few years, Montgomery said.

“We’ve been fighting this issue, and it’s progressively getting worse,” he said of overcrowding at the jail. “We are out of options.”

Montgomery said that if the county agrees to adding 50 beds, it also will hire nine new employees at the jail.

County Judge Mickey Pendergrass said officials won’t know how much the expansion will cost until justices of the peace decide on a plan. Architects will present a handful of design ideas and their expense during today’s meeting.

“After [the meeting], we will present the ideas to the Quorum Court with a proposal to solve an issue that’s been staring at our face for a while,” Pendergrass said. “We’ve been looking at a continual growth in the jail’s population since it opened in 2005.”

In 2013, Montgomery had workers use cutting torches to remove 58 beds from the jail because the county could not afford to house all of its prisoners. Justices of the peace revised the county’s budget, appropriating enough money to afford Montgomery’s expenses, and the sheriff replaced the beds.

It’s an issue several Arkansas counties face, said Mike Godfrey, executive director of the Arkansas Sheriffs’ Association.

“Overcrowding is a univeris sal problem,” he said.

Godfrey said the growth in population in some cities, an increase in drug-related crimes across the state and the fact that most county jails hold inmates who are awaiting transfer to the Arkansas Department of Correction cause the overfilled jails.

There are between 1,200 to 1,500 state inmates held in Arkansas’ 60 county jails each day, he said.

“Sheriffs are forced to make a decision of who stays in jail and who gets out,” said Godfrey, a former Polk County sheriff. “The first thing I did each day was figure out who would go. If we had a capacity of 26 inmates and a population of 30, I had to decide which four would go.”

Pendergrass said Baxter County’s neighbors also face overcrowding problems and cannot hold his county’s prisoners. Marion County, Baxter County’s neighbor to the west, is building a new jail after its Quorum Court approved financing one, but it won’t be completed for at least two years.

Godfrey said other counties have discussed building regional jails and sharing expenses.

Baxter County Justice of the Peace Lucille Soltysik of Mountain Home said she will propose placing a 0.25 percent sales tax on the county ballot if the Quorum Court approves any proposals from today’s meeting.

Voters in 2010 turned down a 0.25 percent countywide sales tax that would have paid for maintenance and operational expenses at the jail.

“Every time someone gets arrested, there’s no room at the jail,” Soltysik said.