The second phase of a consultant's report being prepared for Vigo County will not change an already delivered recommendation that a new jail have a capacity of 527 beds in order to meet the county's needs through 2050.
The second phase of the study, according to an email from the consultant to county officials, will focus more on conditions and programming that will affect jail populations.
Bob Murray, president of the Taxpayers Association of Vigo County, on Tuesday asked county commissioners what impact the second part of the consultant's study and report -- which are still underway -- would have on projected jail populations and bed needs.
Commissioner Jon Marvel then produced a Monday email from Kenneth Ray, president of RJS Justice Services of Ashland, Ky., to county officials.
Ray's efforts are part of a collaboration that includes RJS, Allen Beck of Kansas, Missouri-based Justice Concepts Inc. and Rod Miller of Gettysburg, Pa.-based Community Resource Services Inc.
Ray, in his email to the county, said Part 1 of the report addressed the county's request for recommendations on whether it should renovate the jail or engage new construction. Part 2 will include additional information regarding the courts and court-related offices that affect case processing.
In Part 2, "recommendations about improvements will be subject to acceptance by judges and court-related office holders who are elected and not subject to control of the county commission.
"It is possible that such recommendations will require some reorganization of structure and/or procedures and in some instances, approval by state authorities," Marvel read from the email.
"Experience in addressing structural improvements is that change is likely to occur more slowly and require up to 5 years before impacts of those changes would be measurable," Marvel read. "It is possible that those changes could have some impact on the future jail population, increase or decrease, but those impacts, if any, do not change the bed forecast and recommendations found in part 1 of the study," Marvel read.
Marvel also read that Part 1 "should be considered a stand-alone document that we believe is sufficient for both court and Indiana Public Law 184-2018 purposes."
Part 2 of the study is expected to be submitted the last week of September.
Asked about the consultant's statements after the meeting, Murray said he "was just curious of what Part 2 would address, and they answered it."
He said he had no statement yet about the content of the consultant's remarks.
Lawsuit update
In a related issue, attorneys for Vigo County officials requested and received a court order for an extension of time until Aug. 17 to respond to a motion by inmates’ attorneys in a federal, class-action lawsuit that alleges conditions at the county jail are unconstitutional.
Plaintiff attorneys Michael K. Sutherlin and Kenneth J. Falk, filed a motion on June 22 seeking a partial summary judgment. They want the federal court to declare that Vigo County’s jail conditions violate the U.S. Constitution and to order county officials to report on progress in finalizing plans for a new county jail or any alternate plans.
Vigo County officials are facing a federal class-action lawsuit and a state lawsuit, and have acknowledged conditions at the overcrowded jail are below par to the point that they’ve become unconstitutional.
Vigo County Jail, per an agreement struck one lawsuit, can house no more than 268. Inmates beyond that number must be housed at other jails at Vigo County’s expense.
County commissioners last year recommended building a new jail, but their funding proposal stalled in the fall when the Vigo County Council did not to act on the commissioners’ request for a 1 percentage point increase in the local income tax.
Commissioners have since returned with a request that would increase the county's total income tax to 2 percent, from 1.25 percent. Of that, 0.45 percent would sunset in 20 years.