Ada County Jail has been overcrowded for years. Officials are still searching for a remedy
Dustin Gardner has been at the Ada County Jail for eight months. In that time, a lot of people have come to the jail for a variety of reasons. Lately, there have been more inmates than beds available.
Many sections of the jail, originally built in 1977, are well beyond their operational capacity, a years-long problem for a jail that officials have long said is too small for the community it serves. The jail failed an inspection as recently as 2018 for having too many inmates, and the situation hasn’t improved much since.
Gardner, as of Thursday, was one of 943 people detained at the jail, about 99% of the main jail’s operational capacity of 949. Some of the dorms are so full that Gardner and others have had to sleep on the floor in makeshift beds called boats, which resemble giant toboggans.
“It’s embarrassing to be at the level where everyone walks by,” Gardner said Friday. “You feel in the way.”
The issue of overcrowding comes as county officials mull ways to fund an expansion of the jail, an addition that has been talked about for years. It’s not the first time: The jail underwent a large expansion in 1995, as well as the additions of a medium-custody unit in 2004, a health-services unit in 2008 and a maximum-security unit in 2013.
But Sheriff Matt Clifford said another expansion needs to happen soon, as the Ada County’s population keeps increasing. The population grew by 26% in the 2010s, according to U.S. Census data.
“We won’t be able to sustain that with our growing population,” Clifford said in an interview.
It’s not just the number of cells and dorms in the prison. Patrick Orr, a spokesperson for the Sheriff’s Office, said the jail needs a bigger kitchen, laundry room and other amenities.
Commissioners considered expansions in the past, but nothing came to fruition. In October 2020, commissioners approved a $44 million expansion to the jail through a lease with Zion’s Bank, but the county ended those plans months later after conservative members were elected.
One of the main criticisms of the lease plan was that it could move forward without the approval of voters, unlike a bond.
Nearly a year later, an expansion still hasn’t been approved. And with the cost of construction and building supplies spiking, Clifford said the overall cost could be well beyond $50 million.
At a luncheon with state legislators on Jan. 4, commissioners did not appear closer to a solution on how to fund an expansion of the jail, or if one was even needed at all.
Commissioners told legislators that there are at least two financing methods for a possible jail expansion: having residents vote in favor of a bond issue, or a lease agreement similar to that with Zions Bank.
The commissioners appeared split on which option would be best. Commissioner Rod Beck said he favored putting a bond out to vote. Such a move would require Ada County voters to approve it by a two-thirds majority in an election. Bonds are typically paid back over 30 years using property taxes.
Commissioner Kendra Kenyon said in a phone interview that she wasn’t sure how successful a bond would be with voters and that she’s not sure it would be the best use of county dollars. Instead, she said trying to keep those suffering from addiction out of jail in the first place might be a better solution.
“The general public doesn’t really understand,” she said. “Our rates of incarceration are extremely high. Do we want to just keep throwing money at that or not?”
A third option could be money from the Legislature. Legislators are facing a big budget surplus this year, and Ada County would like state financial help to help ease the potential burden on local taxpayers, Kenyon said. She said former Sheriff Steve Bartlett was leading those discussions before his sudden retirement in June.
COVID-19 and vacancies present new complications for jail
While overcrowding is not a new issue, its urgency is growing just as the county – and many other employers – face massive staff shortages, stemming from a number of vacant positions and workers calling in sick after they test positive for COVID-19.
The Sheriff’s Office had 81 vacancies as of Nov. 29, including nine registered nurses who would be working in the jail. Beck told legislators that the county used federal coronavirus-relief funds to hire temporary nurses, which cost twice as much as full-time nurses.
Sgt. Amber Geisel, who has worked at the sheriff’s office since 2006, said the jail had eight deputies out on Friday, Jan. 7, stretching the already-thin staff
Cases of COVID-19 have also been on the rise in Ada County and the rest of Idaho. Ada County currently has a seven-day average of 267 reported cases, compared with 69 at Christmas, according to the New York Times.
The positivity rate at the jail, about 6%, remains lower than it’s been in previous months when it was closer to 9%. But only 33% of inmates were fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as of Jan. 4, according to county data.
“COVID of course makes things a little bit more difficult,” Clifford said. “Instead of just having to house people … now we have to quarantine people, and finding the space to do that can be a challenge.”
Expanding the jail is something Geisel and other staff members say is becoming increasingly necessary. They said they were “frustrated” when commissioners scrapped expansion plans last year after jail officials had spent weeks planning out bits of the expansion among themselves.
“We talk about it all the time,” Geisel said.
Commissioner says county ‘missing the boat’ on addiction
But Commissioner Kendra Kenyon said she thinks there’s more to the overpopulation than just a growing county. It’s also why people are getting put in jail in the first place.
Jail data show more than half of all charges facing current inmates are drug-related. Kenyon told legislators that a focus on treatment, rather than incarceration, could decrease the jail’s population and avoid an expensive rebuild.
“Are we missing the boat here? Should we be talking about behavioral mental health and substance abuse facilities (instead of) warehousing facilities?” she said.
Kenyon said she would prefer to see more inmates suffering from addiction held at county-operated transition centers. The county operates one transition center on 7255 Barrister Drive that opened in September, where inmates nearing the end of their sentences can work in the community.
But Kenyon said she would like the county to open a transition center geared toward treating people with substance abuse disorders, instead of keeping them in jail.
Clifford said the Sheriff’s Office is already doing what it can to keep people out of the jail that his office can supervise on probation and other programs. The problem is that a growing county, with more potential offenders, means decreasing that net figure can prove challenging, he said.
“Our population in the jail has become very hardened over the years because we’ve done a really great job of getting people out and keeping the people in that need to stay,” he said.
He said that, whatever is decided to decrease overcrowding, it needs to come soon. The county is running out of time.
“At the rate that this county is growing, we will not be able to keep up a lot longer,” Clifford said.
This story was originally published January 11, 2022 at 4:00 AM.
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