Boyd County Detention Center Lower Prisoner Numbers
The Kentucky Department of Corrections has ordered the Boyd County Detention Center to dramatically lower the number of prisoners being held at the jail. Full report on the Herald Dispatch.
The jail was expanded to hold 205 prisoners last November,
but the jail population was more than 360 inmates earlier this week.
County Attorney Phil Hedrick said the county had lowered that number to about 300 by Friday and is working to get the numbers lower.
“We’re already taking steps to decrease the number of prisoners,” Hedrick said Friday. “I plan to meet with the Department of Public Advocacy to see who we can recommend to the judges to release. We’re talking about people who can’t make bond on petty crimes or can’t pay fines. We might be about to get another 30 to 50 people released. We’re going to get where we need to be.”
County Jailer Joe Burchett said in a press release that with the jail at almost twice its capacity, staffing, safety, sanitation and services all were compromised.
The jail was holding more than 260 county prisoners and about 80 state and federal prisoners. The state and federal prisoners bring in between $800,000 and $1 million per year to the county. All the state prisoners have been moved out along with some of the federal prisoners, Hedrick said.
“My attempts to house paying customers to cover the cost of county prisoners were well intended, but failed in the end,” Burchett said. “We now have no paying inmates, but are still over our legal bed limit. As I look at other counties of our size, we jail twice as many inmates as our neighbors. I have no control over whom we put in here or when we let them out.”
“I don’t think this county can afford to house all of the non-violent offenders we currently house,” Burchett said. “Maybe we need a different way of punishing less dangerous inmates instead of letting them take up valuable space in the jail. Considering the public’s safety, we need to reserve those beds for dangerous people.”
He said less dangerous prisoners could instead be used as part of a county work program.
“Instead of being a burden to the taxpayers, these individuals could repay the community through work programs or alternative incarceration programs,” Burchett said.
County Commissioner Carl Tolliver said the housing of county prisoners “is a big problem for all the counties in Kentucky.”
“We’re working on it,” he said. “Maybe we can get the numbers down and then get back the state and federal prisoners who help fund the jail.”
The county can charge to house federal and state prisoners, but get no income from housing county prisoners, he said.
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