Commission to consider expanding county jail

By Joel Davis
of The Daily Times Staff

With inmate population pressures mounting at the county jail, the Blount County Budget Committee will discuss whether to finance an expansion using room-and-board money paid for housing federal prisoners.

Finance Director Dave Bennett has advised the committee it will need to address the possibility of expanding the jail.

"As it stands right now, the jail is full," Bennett said during a Wednesday interview.

Currently, the jail houses, on average, 400 to 420 inmates per day. On Tuesday, there were 409, including 160 federal prisoners. The jail is only certified for 350, Sheriff James Berrong said.

According to Berrong, the only category of prisoner population he can feasibly cut is the number of federal prisoners held in the jail, but doing so would reduce the amount of money the county receives from the federal government. This would have to be offset through increasing the amount of money spent out of the county general fund.

Bennett, however, sees a way out if the county acts soon. The county could fund the construction and operation of a new pod at the jail with the revenues from the increased number of federal prisoners it would allow to be housed.

According to an April 7 memo to the Budget Committee, Bennett estimates a $7 million bond for the project could be paid off in 10 years with the county still reaping net revenues estimated from $417,404 the first year to $1.5 million per year in later years, about $12.1 million in all.

The daily rate that the U.S. Marshals Service pays to house federal inmates in the Blount County Jail is $58.50 per inmate. In the 2006-2007 fiscal year, the Sheriff's Office brought in more than $2.1 million in revenue to the Blount County general fund by housing federal inmates. Through June 30, this will have brought in an estimated $3.3 million to the county, Assistant Chief Deputy Jeff French said. The revenue is used to offset the costs to operate the jail.

Waiting too long would mean the county could have to fund the project with its own money, Bennett said.

"Based on the projections of how our jail population is growing, in about 10 years we will need to build a new pod for our local inmate population," he said. "During the next during 10 years that will go away because as the local population goes up, those federal prisoners will be moved out. Then when we have to build the new pod, we're going to have to do that with local dollars."

Berrong said that decision will be up to the County Commission.

"We're willing to take on the extra burden," Berrong said. "Financially, it has a lot of advantages to the taxpayer if the commission chooses to do this. This is a way to pay for it and have it in place, but we're not the ones who make the decision. We're content doing our job. Whatever decision they make, we'll go with."

Building a new pod would take care of local correction needs for 25 to 30 years, unless the county underwent a massive change in population in coming years, Berrong said.