Detention center changing lives, sheriff tells Rotary
Seven months since its opening, the new Garland County Detention Center has had 60 inmates graduate with the assistance of rehabilitation programs, Sheriff Mike McCormick told Hot Springs National Park Rotary Club on Wednesday.
“When they leave we hope that they are a little better than they were when they came in,” McCormick told the club’s weekly noon luncheon at the Arlington Resort Hotel & Spa. “I’d like to think of it as just a jail, but it is more. We’re changing lives and working real hard at that.”
The $42 million detention center offers substance abuse, mental health care, anger management and GED programs to assist inmates in their re-entry into Garland County after their release. The center now provides mental health care to inmates that has never been previously offered, a growing concern of McCormick’s during his long career.
“Over 33 years in law enforcement, I have dealt with mental illness on other peoples’ part on almost a daily basis,” McCormick said. “It is so frustrating and difficult to get them the proper health care that they need. Many times it isn’t addressed. But when they get incarcerated, they now have access to mental health care that they’ve never had access to before.”
Through a partnership with National Park College, inmates are able to acquire a GED, and one inmate applied for an Oaklawn Foundation scholarship. NPC also offers a wage program that assists inmates with testing and pre-qualifying for future employment.
“Sixty inmates have graduated from the various programs and to my knowledge, only three have been booked back in,” McCormick said. “Inmates are offered to participate in the programs with the potential of getting out early instead of sitting in jail. Most are opting to participate.”
State prisoners are accepted at the center if they have been convicted within the county until the state takes them. At a capacity between 250 to 270, McCormick hopes to keep the inmate populaMore
tion below its maximum of 350 to ensure the facility can run without adding more personnel.
In the past, the older detention center was like a “revolving door,” McCormick said.
“By the time I’d arrest someone, bring them to the detention center and get done with all the paperwork, he or she would be gone before I was finished with them,” McCormick said. “This was only if we were allowed to take them to the detention center. It was completely full. In order to take someone in, they’d have to release someone else.”
An accreditation of the detention center is being sought by Chief Deputy of Corrections Mark Chamberlain by the beginning of 2017. The accreditation would assist in more federal government funding for the facility.
“It takes a lot of work and money to get accredited,” McCormick said. “It ensures a professional environment with procedures and policies in place, which we already have. It’s just a matter of jumping through the various hoops to get the approval.”
McCormick also made note of the 18th Judicial District East Drug Task Force’s work in Garland County. Currently, three of the 16 investigators from the Criminal Investigation Division operate on the DTF. Heroin has resurfaced on the streets as the “drug of choice” due to its cheap cost, leaving methamphetamine labs almost nonexistent, McCormick said.
“We have had some of the biggest drug arrests in my entire career over the past 12 months,” McCormick said. “The drug task force has done huge things this year and it is reflecting upon Hot Springs’s crime and drug activities.
“We are still dealing with people who are high on drugs and alcohol. What you are seeing now is more and more people getting arrested. Now we have a place to put them. It results in a safer Garland County.”