Debate continues over jail expansion
Officials from Rockbridge County, Buena Vista and Lexington still have not approved an expansion of the Rockbridge Regional Jail.
But the expansion's most visible opponent, Buena Vista Mayor Todd Jones, says some progress was made at a Feb. 20 meeting.
"The meeting we had last week was really the meeting that we needed to have a year ago. . . ,"Jones said. "[We need] to ask why are we doing it this way?"
Last February the consulting firm Moseley Architects studied the growth of arrests in the three localities. It reported that the number of adult arrests in Rockbridge County increased by 167 percent from 2001 to 2006. The firm concluded that by 2021, 182 jail beds would be needed. The jail currently has a capacity of 56 beds, but by double-bunking many beds, it can increase capacity to 98.
Rockbridge Regional Jail Superintendent John Higgins presented that information again at the Feb. 20 meeting. Moseley Architects was there, too.
Jones said he had one question for them:
"Why has the jail population increased twice as much as the general population in the same amount of years?"
Jones sees no reason for the proposed 187 beds. If those spaces are double-bunked, the jail could house up to 374 inmates.
"You know you're not going to need those beds,"he said. "It defies common sense for a little jurisdiction like this, even in a worst-case scenario."
For the expansion to go forward, Rockbridge County, Lexington and Buena Vista must all pass a resolution that has been approved by the Virginia Department of Corrections. But when Higgins asked for that approval in September, the Buena Vista City Council refused.
Jones persuaded the Buena Vista City Council once again to shoot down the proposed expansion last week. And while he characterizes what he calls mass incarceration as immoral, Jones said the council's biggest objection is that the expansion would cost Buena Vista another $270,000.
"The bottom line is that we would have to raise taxes to fund this new jail,"he said.
The ongoing opposition from Buena Vista frustrates Higgins.
"They want a new study that'll cost $100,000 for the darn same information,"Higgins said this week.
At one time, the three localities made money on the jail by using available beds to house prisoners from other jurisdictions. But with the jail consistently housing more than 100 inmates a day now, running the facility will cost taxpayers in Rockbridge County $528,000, Buena Vista $158,000 and Lexington $55,000 this year.
"If the jail isn't expanded soon the cost to Lexington taxpayers will be double in a few years what it is now,"Higgins said.
In Lexington, City Manager Jon Ellestad supports a bigger jail, but like Jones he is wary of what is currently proposed.
"Clearly the jail needs to be expanded,"Ellestad said. "Shipping [inmates to other facilities] is going to be way more expensive in the long run. . . . [But] I've always been a little uncomfortable with 187 beds. Just because you can double bunk doesn't mean it's a good idea. . . . I agree with the mayor of Buena Vista. I don't think we should lock everyone and his brother up."
Ellestad acknowledges that the localities' options are limited.
"Right now we need a real solution, and expanding the jail is the only real alternative we have,"he said. "I don't think [Jones] should come to the conclusion that the jail shouldn't be expanded… because it obviously needs to be."
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