NATCHEZ, Miss. – The head of a Texas prison-building company said he’ll draw up plans and estimate the costs for a new Adams County jail using recycled modular structures from the private prison located near Natchez.
Meeting Monday with the Adams County Board of Supervisors, ModCorr President Buddy Johns said he’ll have details to present in a month or so.
Adams County supervisors have acknowledged for years the need for a new jail to replace the county’s half-century-old facility, but they haven’t been able to decide how to fund it.
Johns said cost-savings can be achieved by using refurbished modular buildings from the private prison that CoreCivic operates in Adams County. Located nine miles east of Natchez, the prison detains immigrants arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
Johns – whose Galveston, Texas-based company specializes in fabricating modular cell units to house inmates – projected a “net savings” of about $4 million for about 130 cells with the reconfigured modules donated by CoreCivic.
County Supervisor Angela Hutchinson said Monday the county could borrow money through a bond issue for a new multimillion-dollar detention center.
Adams County’s 50-year-old jail has been deemed unsustainable, unsafe and largely uninhabitable. Most of Natchez-Adams County’s detainees charged with crimes are currently jailed in Concordia Parish’s prison, but some remain behind bars in Adams County’s downtown Natchez jail.
The city closed its jail a few years ago. People arrested by the Natchez Police Department have been housed in the Adams County and Concordia Parish facilities.
A report prepared by jail experts in January for county supervisors and Sheriff Travis Patten detailed the need for a new jail with various projections and alternatives on how many inmates it should be built for.
A “best-case scenario” presented by the consultants has a jail built to hold 99 inmates. “Worst-case scenario”: 188 inmates. This is driven largely by inmates’ average length of stays, which has increased in recent years to 30 days, according to the report prepared by the consultants at Justice Planners and Detention Operations.
The report pointed to the importance of Natchez-Adams County officials collaborating in building a new jail and determining how big it should be.
“City officials expressed an interest in participating as well. The outcome of these discussions should be a clear consensus on the direction the county will take toward a replacement detention center. If the decision is to move forward, there must be a decision on the total capacity of the new facility,” states the report.
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