Detention center needs accreditation
Taos County’s detention center must get accredited by the New Mexico Association of Counties. In light of an investigation by the nonprofit Searchlight New Mexico published in Taos News Oct. 22 (“Cruel and Usual”), which detailed alleged heavy-handed use of force by the jail’s administrator, the Taos County Commission needs to step in and both require an independent review of grievances and require accreditation.
Former jail director Nelson Abeyta said he wanted to pursue accreditation but was canned before he could pursue it. The next administrator, Karen De La Roche, might also have pursued accreditation – but she didn’t last long enough either.
Commissioners are supposed to do a walk through of the detention facility once a year. But their focus seems to have been on the condition of the facility. The last mention of the detention center in the Taos County Commission’s agendas was the purchase of new security cameras on July 21, and on Sept. 15 a discussion of a program to help people before they are incarcerated.
Running a detention center is undeniably tough, especially now during a pandemic. Guards and the director oversee inmates who may have varying degrees of mental illness, violent tendencies, addictions, medical conditions, suicidal thoughts and other challenges. Jail staff are supposed to prevent inmates from hurting themselves or others, without using undue force.
They have to be part-time counselors, psychologists and medical staff – despite a lack of training required to do all of those tasks well.
Accreditation – which is good for three years – is one way to ensure all jail staff have the best possible training and understand best practices for handling the multitude of challenges they face working with people who are incarcerated. It shows they meet the Adult Detention Professional Standards as laid out by a team with the Association of Counties.
Only nine out of 33 counties in New Mexico have been accredited. Obviously it isn’t easy. It takes time and costs money. Current jail director Leroy Vigil said as much in the Searchlight story. Taos County has never formally applied for accreditation.
But as reporters Elizabeth Flock and Mark Scialla point out in their story, it would be cheaper than the million and a half dollars the county has paid to settle lawsuits in the last few years.
As commissioner Tom Blankenhorn said in a 2016 meeting, overseeing the jail “is about as difficult a thing as we have to do — and certainly the most expensive.”
The county commission sets policy for the detention center. This elected body must require that the jail go through the accreditation process, find the funding to back that endeavor and throw the weight of their support behind it. The fee to NMAC to begin accreditation is $2,500.
The staff has the ability to meet the state’s high standards. County manager Brent Jaramillo agrees the jail should pursue accreditation.
It likely would help the county’s defense the next time it faces a lawsuit – or an investigative report – over how the jail is managed.