County May Use Geiger To Ease Jail Crowding Inmates Can Be Housed More Cheaply At West Plains Facility Where 120 Beds Sit Empty

Even as the Spokane County Sheriff’s Department struggles to deal with overcrowding in its jail, 120 beds sit empty at Geiger Corrections Center, where it costs $14 a day less to keep an inmate.

Geiger is a low-security county facility west of Spokane that has typically housed more federal inmates than county prisoners. Now its federal inmate population is falling.

On Tuesday, corrections officials and county commissioners talked about shifting inmates from the jail into Geiger’s empty beds to save taxpayers about $500,000 a year.

But the savings will evaporate, county officials warn, unless they cap the number of inmates who can be kept at the jail. Otherwise, judges who see the jail population falling might order more people incarcerated instead of using other sentencing options.

“Experience (from other counties) tells us if there are empty beds, they will be filled up,” said county Administrator Jim Lindow, who formerly was director of corrections.

“Obviously, we want to be putting dangerous people away,” but not overburden taxpayers, said Commissioner Kate McCaslin.

Built to handle 460 inmates, the county jail has housed an average of 650 a day this year. If that trend continues, the jail will finish the year about $1 million over its budget, sheriff’s Capt. Jim Hill warned commissioners last month.

More inmates mean corrections officers must work longer hours, said Hill. Other expenses increase, as well. For instance, Hill recently asked to buy more bunk beds, a request that commissioners rejected after learning that Geiger can handle more inmates.

There have been some empty beds at Geiger for years, said Gary Oberg, county director of corrections. The number of vacancies has jumped significantly - and will climb even higher by the end of the year - because the federal government is sending fewer inmates to Geiger.

Vacancies aren’t filled with county inmates because commissioners expect Geiger to earn its own keep. That means renting beds to the city and the federal government for more than the $35 it costs to house an inmate.

Any profit is used to house county inmates. So a drop in federal inmates means Geiger has more empty beds but can afford to house fewer low-risk county inmates. Most county inmates remain in the jail, where tighter security brings the cost to about $49 a day.

As recently as 1995, inmates sentenced by federal judges filled 235 of the 450 beds at Geiger.

The county charges $54 a day for each of those inmates, most of whom are from the Spokane area. The deal is so lucrative, county officials talked last year of expanding Geiger so it could take more federal prisoners if they became available.

But the federal government has overbuilt its prison system and has empty beds in Seattle and California, said Oberg. Those beds must be filled before the feds send prisoners to Geiger, said Oberg, who expects the number of federal inmates under his watch to be no more than 30 by September.

On Tuesday, Oberg and Geiger Administrator Mike Pannek told commissioners they could fill the vacancies if Geiger received $35 per day from the county budget for each inmate housed. The money would come from the sheriff’s department, which would still come out $14 ahead.

The plan means a shift in thinking. Instead of a self-supporting facility, Geiger would become a beneficiary of the county budget.

Oberg said at least 100 inmates at the jail were approved by judges to go to Geiger. Many Geiger inmates are sent out on work crews, earning money for the county to keep their cost of incarceration low.

The county also is considering putting high-security fencing around one building at Geiger so the center could take medium-risk inmates. That would help keep all the beds filled at times when there are too few low-risk inmates, said Oberg.

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