New Regional Jail Opens This Week
When the Western Virginia Regional Jail near Dixie Caverns opens Friday, local officials will be breathing a sigh of relief. Not only will the regional facility relieve overcrowding in the Franklin County jail, it will mean less man hours spent by deputies transporting prisoners, said Franklin County Sheriff Ewell Hunt. Report from the Franklin News-Post.
“During the months of December and January, we logged 15,340 miles transporting inmates to other facilities,” Hunt said. “This consumed 613 man-hours, or the equivalent of two people, full time, doing nothing but transports.” Hunt said the largest population of prisoners are now held at the Middle River Regional Jail in Staunton, which is a 220-mile round trip, a journey that was made by county deputies 37 times in December and January. “Our current situation is tenuous,” said Rick Huff, county administrator, “because, beyond our own facility, we are operating on a space-available basis with jails as far as two hours (drive) away. The regional jail was our most cost-effective alternative to assuring that we will have a place to hold the inmates we are legally responsible for.”
Franklin County decided to join Montgomery and Roanoke counties and the City of Salem to build the regional jail about four years ago. The joint effort was chosen because the state has a policy of reimbursing 50 percent of capital costs for regional facilities. That means the three counties and one city will share in paying about $46.8 million of the $93.6 million total cost of the facility.
Franklin County’s jail was built in 1937 and certified to hold 49 prisoners. The county is currently responsible for about 200 inmates in 12 different facilities around the state and has no guarantee that those facilities will have beds available if the county needs them … The county plans to keep its existing jail open to house about 60 pretrial and workforce prisoners.