Jail fund vote may share ballot

Kootenai County voters will decide in November whether to pay for a jail expansion that could provide 480 additional beds and keep violent offenders, gang members and felons segregated.

Yet it’s unclear if a separate measure to pay for a new sheriff’s administration building and 911 center will make the ballot.

Specifics about the potential ballot measures and the price tags will remain unclear until an architectural consultant presents recommendations to the Kootenai County Commission, possibly by month’s end.

“We’re still putting all the parts together,” Kootenai County Commission Chairman Rick Currie said.

The move means voters in two Inland Northwest counties could be deciding whether to increase taxes to pay for new jails. Spokane County authorities are expected to ask for voter approval this fall for a new jail to replace Geiger Corrections Center, but a final decision has yet to be made.

In Kootenai County, the commission wants the jail measure on the November ballot because it’s the last chance to utilize the popular local-option sales tax to pay for the expansion. The state law allowing the half-cent sales tax increase, in which 50 percent of all revenues raised go toward property tax relief, expires in 2009.

Ideas on what the jail expansion should look like and the cost vary depending on which elected official is asked, especially in the weeks before the Republican primary in which Currie and Commissioner Todd Tondee are fighting to keep their jobs, along with Sheriff Rocky Watson.

Currie said the priority is expanding the current jail facility to handle the inmate population until 2020, which would likely mean adding about 480 beds to the 325-bed facility.

That’s about the same number of beds recommended by consultant KMB Justice Facilities Group in its initial survey in 2005.

But voters narrowly rejected a $50 million sales tax proposal that year. Currie said the new cost is a lot higher, perhaps $75 million, but he is against such a price tag.

Watson agrees with the number of needed beds but estimates the cost will probably top $100 million because the cost of building materials has increased dramatically.

The sheriff also has a broader vision and wants the ballot to include a proposal for a new administration building.

State law only allows the sales tax to pay for the jail itself so voters would likely have to approve a separate bond measure, which means an increase in property taxes, to pay for the other sheriff’s facilities, Watson said.

He knows it’s expensive, but the public is demanding public safety and that doesn’t mean just jails, Watson said. He said the current administration building next door to the jail is so overcrowded that detectives are working out of closets and the county has to rent space for staff meetings and trainings.

Watson said if the 911 center isn’t expanded, the county soon won’t have the ability to handle all incoming calls.

Yet Watson worries the commission will ignore the needs, just as he alleges it has for more deputies and increased pay.

It’s no secret that Watson and the commissioners, especially Currie, have a strained relationship.

“The commissioners are supposed to be visionaries,” Watson said. “I hope they look at it and don’t ignore it.”

Currie argued that the commission isn’t ignoring anything and has been trying to find money in the budget every year to help with deputy pay.

Currie is fearful that if voters are asked to approve both jail expansion and an administration building and 911 center, the whole package would fail.

Tondee agreed that the jail is a priority over the administration building and 911 center but said that’s why the commission asked the consultant to do a master plan for all the facilities. He wants to see the results before making judgments.

Currie and Watson are also at odds over whether to have inmates work sorting recyclables at the transfer station under construction off Pleasant View Road just west of Post Falls.

Currie said it’s a great idea but that it wouldn’t work because of liability issues and concerns about inmate health.

He said there’s too much risk transporting inmates and that the commission toured recycling centers in Seattle and Salt Lake City and think the facilities are unhealthy.

He said inmate workers would have to wear protective gear to filter the air, adding that the dust was so thick at a Seattle-area center it made a person in their tour party ill. He said inmates already look for reasons to sue the county and that the recycling center would give them more.

Watson toured the same facilities and said he doesn’t recall anyone wearing respirators or other protective gear. He said non-inmate workers do the same job without health problems. And if an inmate did get ill, it would be covered by the county worker’s compensation policy.

Currie admitted that was true but said insurance costs would skyrocket and that it’s the commission, not the Sheriff’s Office, that’s responsibility for liability.

As for transportation, Watson said that’s not a risk because the county already transfers inmates every day to Montana and Washington to ease overcrowding.

Tondee said he thinks the recycling center idea is feasible and that he wants inmates to work. But he acknowledged there may be too many problems to work out.