Supervisors tackle Riverside County jail overcrowding
Riverside County supervisors today will weigh thecounty’s options for relieving jail overcrowding — and stemming the tide ofinmates released for lack of space — by expanding existing correctionalfacilities as well as possibly building new ones.
The Board of Supervisors will hear its first report from a committeeformed in June under a joint proposal by Supervisors Marion Ashley and JeffStone titled “Incarcerate More Prisoners Responsibly In SatisfyingOverwhelming Need,” or IMPRISON.
The report highlights startling statistics regarding county jail space –the most notable being the prospective release by the end of this year of9,276 inmates who are either awaiting trial or who have been sentenced.
“Jail overcrowding, coupled with a federal (court) order cappingallowable jail population, has forced the sheriff … into releasingadjudicated inmates, as well as those who are in post-arraignment pretrialstatus,” the IMPRISON committee states in a 97-page report to the board.
In 2012, Sheriff Stan Sniff released 6,990 inmates from the county’sfive jails — an unprecedented number, he said — because there wasn’t enoughroom for them. A 20-year-old federal court order mandates that the county havea jail bed for every detainee or selectively release inmates to make room forincoming ones. Early releases are known as federal “kickouts.”
The county has 3,906 beds available. All neighboring counties have morebeds than Riverside, the IMPRISON report states.
According to the report, conditions have been exacerbated by AssemblyBill 109, also known as the Public Safety Realignment Act of 2011.
Under the law, so-called “non-serious, non-violent” offendersconvicted of felonies that do not stem from a sexual offense are to serve theirsentences in local detention facilities. Proponents of realignment suggestedthat jail sentences would be capped at three years, but that has not held true;as of February, around 200 inmates in Riverside County jails were serving inexcess of three years behind bars.
AB 109 also made counties responsible for prosecuting and incarceratingprobation and parole violators whose offenses do not fall into the “serious orviolent” category. As of last month, the total number of AB 109 cases was 693,or 18 percent of the jail population, according to Sniff.
Further exacerbating capacity constraints, the number of county jailbeds has increased by only 31 percent in the last 12 years while the overallcounty population has jumped 45 percent, according to the IMPRISON report.
A sheriff’s needs assessment submitted in 2011 estimated that the countywould need 2,342 additional inmate beds a year just to keep up with demandand avoid putting violators back on the street. According to a study byAssistant Sheriff Steve Thetford, the county will need 10,000 more beds by 2028and 14,000 beds by 2030 to keep pace.
Further fueling concerns is the rising crime rate. The report noted “asignificant increase in both violent and property crimes of 6.5 percent and 7.9percent, respectively” throughout the unincorporated communities in 2012,compared to 2011. The committee estimated the total number of arrestee bookingsin 2015 will be 60,014, versus 56,132 in 2012 — a 7 percent growth rate.
The only jail expansion in the works is the East County DetentionCenter, which will replace the Indio Jail, adding 1,600 beds, for a net gain of1,250. But groundbreaking on the project isn’t scheduled until next year, withcompletion projected for 2016, according to county officials.
The committee recommended to the board that the county hire anindependent consultant to “fully explore” short-, mid- and long-term capacityneeds.
Ashley and Stone in June advocated beginning a fourth expansion of theSmith Correctional Facility in Banning, and the committee agreed that a 600-bedexpansion is viable. Enlarging the Robert Presley Jail in Riverside, theSouthwest Detention Center in Murrieta and the Blythe Jail were not determinedto be near-term possibilities.
However, the committee underscored that a “regional detention center… to house long-term sentenced inmates” is “essential.”
The proposed Mid-County Detention Center, or Hub Jail, was knocked offthe county’s list of capital improvement priorities in 2011 in the face of whatsupervisors then agreed were prohibitive costs.
The $300 million facility was to have been erected on a 200-acre site inWhitewater, just off Interstate 10, on the eastern approach to Palm Springs,and provide 1,200 to 4,800 inmate beds. Coachella Valley tourism andhospitality interests widely opposed the concept, saying it would severelydegrade the area’s appeal.
