JAIL OVERCROWDING: RELIEF AHEAD, BUT PRICE IS HIGH

Counties Concerned About How They'll Pay For New Regional Jail

As Wayne County Sheriff Dave Pennington listens to a correctional officer
tell him there are 50 inmates housed in his jail, which is designed to hold
20, he can only shrug his shoulders.

"Well, what's new?" Pennington asks.

Pennington has dealt with a swollen population at the jail since he took
over as sheriff in 2001, he says as he enters a 20-by-15 foot room that is
meant to be out-of-cell relief for inmates. Instead, the room is lined from
wall to wall with 11 mattresses for the jail's trusties.

Up on the second floor, space is just as tight. Eight inmates -- violent
and nonviolent offenders -- are crammed into a cell block with three bunks.

"Tempers flare a lot," says inmate Steve Stewart, who is serving a
six-month sentence for domestic battery. "It's real easy to get on each
other's nerves."

As far as Pennington is concerned, it's not going to hurt an inmate by
sleeping on a mattress on the jail floor, he says.

"But it shouldn't be this way," Pennington says. "When an inmate is in
jail, they deserve the proper bunk, food and medical care."

Pennington's concerns with overcrowding should be alleviated in December
when the Western Regional Jail is scheduled to open near Barboursville.
Prisoners from Wayne, Cabell, Putnam, Lincoln and Mason counties will feed
into the 400-bed facility.

The jail will be the ninth of 10 regional facilities that are part of a
master plan by the state to replace aging and overcrowded county jails. The
plan was born in the wake of an audit in the 1980s by the U.S. Department
of Justice that revealed there was only one jail in West Virginia that met
federal operational standards, said Steve Canterbury, executive director of
the state Regional Jail Authority.

"The bottom line is that without the regional jail plan moving forward,
nearly every county in this state would have a federal lawsuit on its hands
for not meeting standards," Canterbury said. "Besides, most counties can't
afford to build new jails."

Officials in Putnam and Lincoln counties say the Western Regional Jail will
provide relief (both counties' jails shut down years ago, forcing them to
send their prisoners to the South Central Regional Jail in Charleston). But
those in Wayne, Cabell and Mason counties are still searching for ways to
pay the $45 per day fee for each prisoner.

Aging county jails need to be closed, officials say

Even though county officials say they face fiscal uncertainty with the
opening of the Western Regional Jail, many admit that it is time to close
their jails.

In 2000, 14 federal lawsuits were filed against two Wayne County Jail
corrections officers, then Sheriff Toby Shy and the Wayne County Commission.

The plaintiffs, both male and female inmates of the jail, alleged sexual
abuse and harassment and mental and physical abuse by jail personnel. A few
of the lawsuits were dropped, but most were settled out of court.

Pennington has not been immune to problems at the jail. In September 2001,
two inmates struck a corrections officer in the head with a three-pound
barbell before jumping out of a third-story window. They were captured by a
federal task force a day later.

"This jail is designed for punishment, but we're in the rehabilitation
stage these days," Pennington said. "Until the regional jail opens, this is
going to be the biggest headache I have."

In Mason County, Sheriff Scott Simms also experiences problems with his
jail. Simms' inmate population in the jail designed to hold 27 sometimes
tops 55.

"Overcrowding has been a major dilemma," Simms said. "We have to scatter
army cots all over the place. It crowds up the quarters, which increases
the tension level and security risks.

"Inmates just have more of a positive, mental attitude when the jail isn't
overcrowded."

Both Pennington and Simms attribute overcrowding as the main problems at
their aging jails.

"An overcrowded jail wreaks havoc with the way we are supposed to classify
inmates," Pennington said. "When we're putting a guy who murdered two
people into a cell with a guy who broke a window, something's not right.
But what else can I do, let them go free?"

According to federal guidelines, Cabell County's jail is also substandard,
Cabell Sheriff Kim Wolfe said. The jail is clean, but dilapidated, he said.

"When I took office it was deplorable," he said. "The first thing I did was
have it cleaned up, but it's still an old building."

On average, there are approximately 200 inmates in the jail, which has 150
beds, Wolfe said.

"It would cost us millions to build a new facility that meets standards,"
he said.

The new regional jail would be an improvement on the conditions available
to the inmates, he said.

Cabell County struggles with jail transition

Cabell County officials contend the Western Regional Jail will strain its
budget on an annual basis, unless an alternative to jailing prisoners is found.

During the 2001-2002 fiscal year, Cabell County spent nearly $1.7 million
to keep prisoners in its 70-year-old jail, according to Jail Administrator
Jim Johnson. If the Western Regional Jail had opened, it would have cost
the county nearly twice that amount, he said.

The county is expected to spend that much on the Western Regional Jail
during the 2003 fiscal year, but it will only be using the new facility for
approximately six months, County Manager Glenn White said. In the first
full year of use, the costs are expected to balloon to nearly $3 million,
he said.

The regional jail will not only increase the county's costs by putting a
$45 per day fee on keeping inmates, but it will also cut out the county's
methods for defraying some of its current jail costs, White said.

The county has been collecting approximately $300,000 per year from
processing fees, pay phone commissions and payments from the State
Department of Corrections for housing prisoners, White said. That revenue,
which helped ease the burden of running a jail, will vanish when the county
jail closes later this year.

The money the county will save by cutting its own jail personnel and
cutting its insurance expenses will not offset the overall costs associated
with the county participating in the regional jail system, White said. But
there are some pluses associated with making the switch to the regional
jail system, he said.

If a prisoner is ill, or if an accident occurs while the prisoner is in
jail, it is the responsibility of the Regional Jail Authority, he said. It
also eliminates the possibility of a prisoner suing the county.

Still, the minuses outweigh the potential pluses, he said.

In the first six months of participation in the regional jail system, the
county will possibly see a $450,000 negative impact on its budget, White said.

Of the five counties set to feed prisoners into the Western Regional Jail,
Cabell County is expected to be the jail's top client, meaning it will bear
the biggest financial burden.

Inmates from Cabell County are expected to make up 65 percent to 70 percent
of the Western Regional Jail population, Canterbury said.

The Cabell County Jail takes in an average of 4,000 prisoners per year,
Johnson said. On any given day, there are between 170 and 200 inmates in
the jail, he said.

The county will also have to contend with other expenses associated with
using the Regional Jail.

A portion of the Cabell County Jail will have to be used as an eight-hour
holding facility for inmates who are brought to the courthouse for trial,
White said. About 10 to 25 prisoners appear in court every day, Johnson said.

"We don't want prisoners hanging around in the halls of the courthouse,"
White said.

The holding facility will require at least eight employees, Johnson said.

Solutions still being developed

The shift to the regional jail system has haunted Wolfe for years.

"A few years ago, I asked several people to start working on this," he said.

The costs associated with housing prisoners has county officials scrambling
to find alternative methods for housing prisoners, such as a day reporting
center or home confinement, Wolfe said.

"Our biggest problem is pretrial people," Johnson said. "About 70 percent
of the people in our jail have not been convicted."

The county's overall plan for dealing with the regional jail is still in
development, White said.

The advantage of having the jail for half of a year is it gives the county
an opportunity to see how it will really work, White said. Once the jail
becomes a reality, county officials will be in a better position to plan
methods to deal with the increased financial responsibility, he said.

"We just need to wait and see," White said.