Inmates are seen sleeping in the large dormitory area during a Feb. 11 interview and tour of the Accountability and Restitution Center.
Having been in use for just two years, the Thurston County Corrections Facility is in need of an expansion. The county commissioners, in partnership with law enforcement and legal entities, are moving forward with plans to build an addition to the jail.
The 6-year-old jail, which wasn’t used for several years, was designed to have an addition built onto it, County Manager Romero Chavez told The Chronicle. But when it was built, the funding for the project was not available. Chavez added the estimated cost of the 110- to 120-bed addition is around $12 million, with the funds coming from the real estate excise tax collected by the county. The project would also have to be bonded, he added.
Currently, the jail has 491 inmates.
The jail is overcrowded, with inmates sleeping on the floor, Commissioner John Hutchings said. The 120-bed addition will help alleviate some of the overcrowding issues.
At the same time, the county is looking at ways to decrease the overall jail population through the Thurston Mason Behavioral Health facility where law enforcement can take mentally ill people instead of jail, he said. In addition to the behavioral health facility, the county is utilizing therapeutic courts such as veterans court or drug court to get people help instead of incarceration.
“I was hoping it would ease some of the overbooking,” Hutchings said. “Those things have come to fruition but there are criminals out there still committing crimes.”
The programs are diverting people from jail, Hutchings said, but it is too soon to get any numbers about how many people have been diverted.
Commissioner Gary Edwards agrees these programs are needed and will help the community as well as decrease the jail population. But at the same time, he believes more should be done to reduce the number of bookings in the jail. One method Edwards suggested is using Antabuse, a medication that causes severe vomiting and stomach pain if alcohol is consumed. He said the court would order a person arrested for a DUI to report to the department in the morning to take the pill instead of jail.
Society has forgotten the rights of the family who could be killed by a drunken driver and has given “all the rights” to the inmates, Edwards said.
“I think that is a mistake society has made,” he said.
In a peer-reviewed academic article published in the American Journal of Law and Medicine in 1980, CH Marco and JM Marco looked at how Antabuse is used in the El Cajon, California, court system. They argue the system does not adequately inform the defendants of the risks and possible toxic side effects of the drug. The authors also contend the court forcing the defendant to take the drug violates their constitutional right to privacy and the effects of the drug could constitute cruel and unusual punishment.
Edwards said he does not totally agree with constructing the addition because he doesn’t believe the jail was a sound investment for the county.
It is in a bad location making transportation difficult for law enforcement and to ferry the prisoners to and from court, he said. The county utilizes technology such as video court appearances. Edwards has been a vocal opponent of the jail since its construction, citing the location and the size as the reason for his opposition.
“We need the jail space; the problem is it is in such a poor location,” Edwards said.
The county is now in need of a new courthouse either in the same location or a new one, Edwards said. Because of the remote location of the jail, no matter where the new courthouse is located the transportation problem still remains.
“All this stuff should have been planned out together,” Edwards said. “But unfortunately they weren’t.”
Space is not the only problem facing the jail, Hutchings said. The county needs more corrections officers to staff the facility. The county must find funding sources for that.
Chavez said the funds to be used for the construction of the addition can only be used for the construction of a jail under state law.
A priority of the county should be to protect all its employees, regardless of the department they work in, Hutchings said.
Edwards said the situation at the jail is litigation in the making, due to the lack of space and the working and living conditions within the facility. A lawsuit could come from either a guard or an inmate, he said.
Starting construction is at least a year out, Chavez said. The county recently hired a project manger, which is the first step in the process. He expects construction to take about two years.
