Sheriff Jack Williams is working this month to convince Greene County voters that the ballot question asking for a $10 million bond issue to build a new county jail is critical and should be approved.
A similar ballot question, but for $12.685 million, failed a year ago. The new proposal is for a jail with five fewer cells, a smaller kitchen, smaller visiting rooms, and fewer vehicle bays.
Williams wants to be sure this time people understand what he sees as the real question.
“The question isn’t whether we want to have a new jail or an old jail,” Williams said at the Community Conversation in Jefferson last week. “The question is if we want a new jail or no jail.”
He said that according to a jail inspection in July, replacing the floor and the entire electrical system in the current jail would allow it to remain open another four years. The jail would need to be closed for four weeks to allow for that work to be completed. The cost to house 15 inmates elsewhere for that time, at $75 per inmate per day, “gets expensive pretty quick,” he said.
If the bond issue is approved the state will not require the county to update the current jail.
Williams talked through dollar figures that are on a mailing all county residents will receive this week. His figures show operating a new jail is less expensive than closing the current jail.
According to his cost comparison, the cost to house 20 inmates in a new jail on average is $165,000 per year. He would hire four additional jailers at an estimated cost of $240,000 per year. That $405,000 per year would provide increased safety and security for inmates, staff, and county residents.
For comparison, he named $450,000 as the cost of housing 15 inmates in other jails. There would still need to be a place to hold arrestees pending their transport elsewhere; Williams estimated staffing cost of a 24-hour holding facility at $300,000 per year. The cost of additional deputies to transport inmates would be an estimated $520,000. Those amounts add up to $1.27 million.
The mailing also provides estimates of the impact on property tax bills. The owner of a home with an assessed value of $250,000 would see an increase in taxes of $121.60 per year, or $10.13 per month.
The owner of 160 acres of agricultural land would pay an estimated $185.12 per year, or $15.43 per month.
Those figures are significantly less than the impact of the 2022 bond request.
Williams also talked about his concern that if there is no jail, the courthouse would eventually be closed. “When you have no jail, what’s the purpose of a courthouse?” he said. “The purpose of a courthouse is to hold court there. As soon as you no longer have a jail in your county, and legislators have tried every year to bring courthouses together, as soon as you don’t have a jail, I’d guess in five or 10 years we’d merge with Carroll County and no longer have a courthouse here.”
There are currently 127 persons waiting for space to serve jail time they’ve been sentenced to. County attorney Thomas Laehn estimates there are more than 100 persons for whom there are outstanding warrants who haven’t been arrested because there would be no place in the jail to put them.
Laehn, who also spoke Thursday, said the jail “is on life support.” He agreed with Williams’ financial assumptions. “In the long run, we save money by building a new jail,” Laehn said.
He, too, talked about the possibility of the state consolidating counties. He said the state court administration published a list of courtrooms slated to be closed “because the legislature is perennially underfunding the judicial branch. A big untold story in the state of Iowa is that the legislature’s not really funding one-third of our government.”
He saw the published list as a threat from court administration to the Iowa legislature to get more funding. Greene County was on the list. “We’ve done everything we can to position ourselves so that won’t happen,” Laehn said.
Enhancing security at the courthouse is one measure the county supervisors have funded to that end.
“If we lose our jail, when it comes time to close courtrooms, that will be an easy criterion for court administration to use. And once we lose our courtroom, other offices will follow suit,” he said.
He added his concern that the county is not able to treat inmates with dignity and respect as human beings. For example, the state now requires jails to provide inmates with natural sunlight to respect their human dignity. The current jail does not meet that requirement.
Jefferson police chief Mark Clouse was also at the Community Conversation.
“I think Jack (Williams) and Thomas (Laehn) and everyone involved has done a great job of thinking this through and preparing numbers and finding answers,” Clouse said.
“I do have a fear that if we come to ‘no jail’, there are things that they, I or no one have thought of yet, especially from the police department side of it…. I think there are a lot of unknowns that would affect the police department as well as the sheriff’s office. (Pictured from left are sheriff Jack Williams, county attorney Thomas Laehn, and chief of police Mark Clouse.
“We need to get the word out so everyone can educate themselves on this issue, and there are several places to go to get that education,” he continued. “No one wants to pay more taxes. I don’t want to pay more, but I think by not taking action now we’re going to wish we had.”
If voters approve the bond issue for a new jail, the current jail would be repurposed as back-up locations for the county officers of auditor, treasurer, recorder, etc. The state is now requiring counties to develop plans for the event that county offices are damaged by natural disaster or other event.
Williams said that if the bond issue is not approved he will budget next year to close the current jail, not to repair it. He said he’d rather prepare to close the jail than wait until the state requires it to be closed.
The bond issue must be approved for at least 60 percent of approval. Absentee/early voting is available beginning Oct. 18 at the courthouse. Polls will be open Nov. 7 from 7 am to 8 pm.
Williams plans other community forums around the county in the coming weeks.
