SHERIFF SEEKS NEW JAIL

Grayson County Sheriff Keith Gary cut to the chase this week in saying he
believes the county should get ready to build a new jail.

The occasion was a Tuesday night meeting co-sponsored by the league of
Women voters of Sherman and Grayson County for a discussion of the need for
a new jail. The discussion revolved around a final report on the
comprehensive correctional needs assessment for which Grayson County paid
$98,000 to have completed. Gary, along with local residents Helen Perkins
and Joe Neal Smith, represented a committee that studied the current jail's
problems.

Some who attended asked what steps the county has taken to implement the
changes suggested in the report and how much longer it will take to
implement others. They also wanted to know if all of those suggestions,
when taken together, would keep the county from needing a new jail.

The sheriff made no bones about his desire to "start all over and do it
right." Doing so, he said, would allow the county to add things desperately
needed like a proper medical facility and an adequate intake and release space.

If a new jail isn't possible, Gary said, then he feels the county should at
least follow consultants' advice and add additional maximum security beds.

Gary praised the work that has already been done to make the changes
indicated in the report. However, he said, he thinks the county should
still get ready to build.

Then, Gary explained the problems at the jail. They are, he said,
multilayered. First is the lack of maximum security beds. While many of the
options discussed for clearing people out of the jail won't affect those
inmates, Gary said they could open up space that might be converted to
maximum security.

State law forbids the county to mix maximum and minimum security inmates.
The county can mix medium security inmates with either their minimum or the
maximum security counterparts.

Second, there is the problem of space in the book-in area. That area was
built in the 1980s to handle about 80 people. Now it handles about 400. He
said the area is just completely out of space and the lack of space makes
it inefficient.

"Until we get more space, it won't get much better," Gary said.

Finally, Gary said the jail needs a space designated for medical treatment.

While Gary gave those who attended a look at the jail from the inside,
Perkins, a licensed chemical dependence counselor, and Smith, a local
defense attorney, both spoke from an outsider's perspective.

Perkins said she has spent decades dealing with addicts in this area.

"Sometimes jail saves (an addict's) life and sometimes it saves other
people's lives," Perkins said. She said she would like to see Grayson
County Jail have space for a treatment facility for drug addicts or at
least have the space hold them until beds open up in other treatment centers.

Smith said the overcrowding at the jail leads back to a "fundamental
change" in the way residents of Grayson County see crime. He said about 10
years ago everyone decided to be "tough on crime." That is all find, Smith
said, but at some point one has to pay for the increased jail population
such a stance causes.

"I don't know that I am for a new jail. I don't know that I am against it,"
Smith said. He said he does know the county is going to have to do
something to address the overcrowding problems.

"The jail commission is not going to let us house maximum security
prisoners in minimum security cells or stack them in like sausages," Smith
said. He said he thinks judges and defense attorneys are doing their part
to move the cases along, but there "are just so many cases that they are
drowning."

Fixing the problems will require more money, more people and more space,
Smith said, and if the county doesn't provide those things, the problems
will stay the same.

The committee members did speak about some things that are working to
reduce the number of people in the jail. From the county's new Drug Court,
to moving paper work faster and keeping better track of inmates, those who
spoke Wednesday night said the county is attacking the problem from every
angle.

Perkins talked about the success of the county's Starr Drug Court. The
Court, run by 59th state District Court Judge Rayburn Nall Jr., gives those
charged with non-violent drug charges a chance to win their battle against
drug addiction. Defendants who are charged with manufacturing drugs cannot
participate in the program.

When asked about the program, Perkins said the Drug Court is getting ready
to graduate its first group of successful candidates. She said the program
has more applicants than it has space. It is popular, she said, because it
provides inmates with a chance to get into a structured program that helps
them turn their lives around.

Inmates accepted into the program have to attend daily Alcoholics Anonymous
meetings, see a probation officer twice a week, pass a drug test twice a
week and attend group and solo counseling sessions. They also have to show
up for court once a month.

They are staying sober," Perkins said. She said those who don't have to
deal with sanctions imposed by the Court. "And those are not pretty."

Gary said everyone in the justice system is working hard to make sure the
paperwork needed to send convicted people off to the Texas Department of
Prisons gets done as quickly and as efficiently as possible. Gary praised
Grayson County Judge Tim McGraw for working to cut the number of days pen
packets take to complete from 30 or 45 to six or 10.

Judge Lauri Blake, 336th State District Court, said the new court
coordinators assigned to each district court have helped to move cases
along and keep better track of them. She said having a supervising court
coordinator who is responsible for keeping track of the oldest cases has
also helped.

Gary talked about the fact that county commissioners recently hired three
new prosecutors to try cases that can't be scheduled in the other courts. A
visiting judge has been hired to hear cases in that court. Grayson County
District Judge Lauri Blake said every effort is being made to move cases
into that new program.

A Family Court, much like the Drug Court, is also being planned. That court
would look at the underlying issues involved in domestic violence charges
and strive to help those defendants stop behavior that result in their
incarceration and the deterioration of local families.

Gary said if the county does not build a completely new jail, he thinks the
county will have to adopt some sort of pretrial release program. He said,
most bondsmen in the area require a defendant to put up 20 percent of their
bond. He proposed that the county go with a program that would allow people
to bon out by putting up 3 percent of their bond amount. He said that would
allow more people to await trial on the outside and free up jail space.

The bottom line, Gary said, is the fact that the people of Grayson County
are either going to have to pay to build a new jail or they are going to
have to pay for programs to keep people out of the current one. Those
programs include the pre-trial release program as well as drug and alcohol
treatment programs.

Others argued that the real issue should come down to deciding between
spending money to deal with the after-effects of the problems or on
treating people before they become problems. Tony Maddox, director of
Mental Retardation Services of Texoma, and others suggested that the money
the county would spend on a jail would be better spent on building a mental
health treatment center.

Gary encouraged people who are interested in the situation at the jail to
get a copy of the report and become better educated about the issues facing
the county's justice system.