Commissioners Get Bottom Line On New Jail

Unfunded Mandate Hard Tack, But Better Than Closure

By the time Chief Deputy Robert Flood got back to the office
from Commissioners' Court and lunch today, the plumber's
pump truck was pulling away from the 40-year-old Bosque
County Jail.

Same old story.

The jail, a tilt-wall concrete structure that houses the
dispatch center, administrative offices for the Sheriff's
Department, the kitchen, visiting area and interview rooms
was backing up with water. Toilets and sinks were
overflowing.

Heavy rains have saturated the rocky soil of the hill that
holds downtown Meridian and the Courthouse at its apex.
Water is streaming down between the strata toward the Bosque
River below. This runoff is invading the sewer pipes from
the Courthouse and the resulting overflow is flooding the
building. It's a health risk, pure and simple.

The problem: The inadequate old structure is situated
smack dab in the middle of the 100-year flood plain.

But there is more. Its flat roof leaks and when it does,
walls are saturated, electrical junction and breaker boxes
short out and fire, smoke and escape alarms go on the blink.

It's not fire that kills, it's the deadly carbon monoxide in
smoke that takes lives and does so in an instant. Without
the proper alarms systems in place and functioning, no one
would know what hit them.

Not good. In fact, horrors.

Not only does the Texas Commission on Jail Standards ride
herd on messy situations like these, it shuts down jails
when staff finds it necessary. When that happens, counties
like Bosque have to board prisoners in neighboring jails -
at about $43 to $45 per day.

According to Deputy Flood, it's the furthest thing from
Commissioner Adan Muñoz's mind. He has always found a way
to work with county officials, but soon the jig will be up.

With a jail population reported at 35 on March 1, that's a
costly per diem expense for a small county - $1,575 per day,
plus the expense of paying certified corrections officers to
transport prisoners back and forth to court, the hospital,
visiting hours and the like.

"I wish we could stick our heads in the sand, but we can't.

"It's here," says County Judge Cole Word. "I wish it wasn't,
but it's here." He recalled that during his first term, the
Court studied the problem of building a new jail up and
down, sideways and back and couldn't come up with an
acceptable solution.

Those days are gone forever, now. It's time to pony up and
pay the piper.

The estimated cost if plans go forward today?

Total cost: $8.5 million amortized over a 20 to 25 year
period with certificates of obligation issued by the Court.

What if they hold off awhile? Maybe until after the
elections, in the fall?

An additional million to a million and a half dollars would
be required because every day the interest rates get higher,
building materials

Copper is up 30 percent. Steel, the kind you need to
reinforce the standard hardened concrete walls eight inches
thick, is up 12 percent. And the list goes on.

The chief problem is overcrowding. With 44 beds, the jail
is way overpopulated when you consider the commission
standards for something called prisoner classification.
They are either low security, medium security or high
security. Low and medium security prisoners may be housed
together. Medium and high security prisoners may be housed
together, but low and high security types are never to be
mixed. Females must naturally be segregated from males.

It's classification security and it involves a factor of 10
percent for the classification of male prisoners and 10
pecent for females.

With the average daily census as recorded by the
commission's staff, the minimum number of beds that makes
sense is 64, expandable to 98 to comply with future
projected jail population growth.

"It's a challenging budget," said Jeffrey E. Heffelfinger of
Southwest Architects, the firm that has designed the totally
open design new jail and law enforcement center to be
located in the Meridian Industrial Park on Hwy., 174.

He told commissioners and taxpayers how a single corrections
officer will be able to supervise the entire jail population
from a central control room. All cells will be visible from
there, the doors automatically controlled. Every last
design criteria is focused on minimizing staffing and energy
requirements, he explained.

For instance, most escapes take place when inmates are sent
to a hospital for medical attention.

Therefore, his design eliminates the problem. There is a
medical room designed in, to be staffed by a physician's
assistant who will be working on a part-time basis. There
will be no need to send inmates to the local hospital where
they come in contact with free world patients, doctors,
nurses and staff.

Visiting hours?

We're talking video, here. Though they have opted to forego
the expense of equipping each cell with a camera for now,
the wiring will go in when the building is constructed.
Visitors will go to the visiting area, the inmate will sit
in a designated chair in his cell and the visit takes place
over video waves.

There will be no need to let all who have visitors out of
their cells.

Since the walls are eight inches thick and the roof is
insulated to an R-30 factor, if the air conditioning goes
out, the cells will hold their comfort zone for two to three
days. The law does not require air conditioning, just
minimal ventilation standards. For an additional $150,000,
the roof can be insulated with urethane foam to increase the
comfort factor that much more

The cost to taxpayers?

If work begins on the site this summer leveling the 21-foot
slope of the rock ground and filling it with more stable
soil, well before the year 2011 wings in and bond financing
is still at 4.8 to 4.9 percent - $.06 per $100 assessed
valuation. Total cost - $9.75 million.

What if they wait until after the elections?

At $10.5 million and a resulting estimated 8 percent cost
increase, you're looking at a substantially higher tax rate,
according to Vince Viaille, managing director of Specialized
Public Finance, Inc., Lubbock, the financial advisory
service contracted to handle the securities issue, subject
to approval by the County Attorney.

The Commissioners' Court could issue Certificates of Obliga-
tion and the work would begin this Spring. If as many as
five percent of registered voters petition, they could force
a bond issue election on the November ballot. Once the bond
issue was approved, they would be distributed and work could
begin in the winter of 2011.

A team of private citizens coordinated by Emergency Services
Manager Dewey Ratliff worked out the design recommendations
with Southwest Architects.

Their ideas will be presented to the public at Town Hall
Meetings in the following places before any decisions are
made final.

* Thursday March 25 at the Meridian Civic Center

* Tuesday March 30 at the Westshore Community Center

* Thursday April 1 at the Old City Hall in Valley Mills

* Tuesday April 6 at the Walnut Springs Community Center

* Thursday April 8 at Bettis Auditorium, Clifton
Elementary School

All meeting times are at 6:30 p.m.