Effort to sell the Oxbow Jail to state hits a snag
Salt Lake County leaders refuse to sell if the state won't agree to pull the 350 condition-of-probation inmates out of the Salt Lake County Detention Center. But House Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, said that demand could be a "deal breaker."
"As we run the numbers, it's just a lot to bring together," Curtis told the Deseret Morning News.
County leaders said the state could just move the 350 prisoners directly into the Oxbow Jail, but that doesn't sit well with Curtis. The purpose of buying Oxbow is to add more beds to the state system, so filling it with inmates from the county would be pointless.
"If we just take them and roll them over to Oxbow and we don't have a new facility, then we're not interested," Curtis said. "The state is not interested and can't really get into the jail business."
Department of Corrections boss Tom Patterson said he'd love to have some more bed space, but if the deal goes along like the county wants, he'll only have 184 beds left in Oxbow for other inmates.
"That doesn't make much sense because it doesn't help with our growth," Patterson said.
Salt Lake County Council Chairman Michael Jensen said he'd prefer the county unload the shuttered jail to the state. But getting the 350 condition-of-probation inmates out, as well, would solve the "long-standing issue of jail reimbursement that's plagued Salt Lake County and counties in general for years and years and years."
That caveat is what convinced Sheriff Jim Winder to support the deal.
The state only reimbursed the county 50 percent of the cost to incarcerate inmates at the jail. In the end, the county ends up subsidizing state inmates by about $4 million a year, Salt Lake County Chief Deputy Sheriff Rollin Cook said.
"We feel as though the state should pay us for what it costs the state prisoner to be in the jail," Jensen said.
But without any state inmates, there is nothing to argue about.
Not so, according to the Department of Corrections. It doesn't make financial sense to now pay 100 percent of the costs for those condition-of-probation inmates when the state was only paying 50 percent before, Patterson said.
"That is just a real change in dynamics for us," Patterson said late Wednesday. "Obviously (the deal) has some issues."
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said in an earlier interview that he supports the deal only if "it fits in with the corrections department's goals, especially housing probationers."
"We need the capacity, and it's already been paid for by the taxpayer," Huntsman said.
E-mail: ldethman@desnews.com
Recent comments
Rollin Cook and Tom Patterson need to come to a compromise on this...
Pat | Feb. 29, 2008 at 8:01 a.m.
