By Stacey Reed
SALT LAKE CITY -- The Salt Lake County Council unanimously accepted a new proposal recently that will release inmates early and implement booking qualifications in an effort to alleviate the shortage of cells in the Salt Lake County Jail.
'As of Wednesday, we had 20 women sitting here without beds,' said Sheriff Paul Cunningham, chief deputy over corrections at the Salt Lake County Sheriff''s Office.
The jail''s maximum cap on prisoners is 2,000 - 1,744 beds for men and 256 beds for women.
Based on traditional arrest and jailing practices, Cunningham said, their amount of female beds is close to normal, but the jail is out of space.
'Every physical bed is filled, male and female,' he said.
Cunningham said he realizes the magnitude of releasing prisoners, and the first thing the Sheriff''s Office always considers in situations like this is public safety.
If we release more on electronic monitoring, Cunningham said, it would be those who are least likely to be a public threat - speeding violators, vandalists or fine violators.
'We don''t want to release more serious offenders who will continue to engage in criminal activity,' he said.
He also said transporting prisoners to other jails would not be practical because inmates would not have close access to their attorneys or pre-trial hearings.
Captain John Carlson of Utah County Jail in Spanish Fork said their facility has been lucky because it floats between 500 and 600 prisoners and hasn''t gone over.
'If we reach that point, we are prepared to divert prisoners to other programs outside the jail,' Carlson said.
If you don''t have open beds for prisoners, Carlson said, you lose control of your facility.
This is one of the reasons Utah County has an ad-hoc committee, headed by Judge Jim Taylor, that discusses current issues, programs and future implementations, he said.
In February 2002, the Salt Lake County Council closed the Oxbow Jail, which was the minimum-security correctional facility in Salt Lake County.
The jail, which held 250 inmates, was closed for budget reasons.
'Because of our economic situation, we had to close it,' said Michael Jensen, chairman of the Salt Lake County Council. 'Closing Oxbow saves us $1million a year.'
The problem with reopening it, Jensen said, is having to operate and manage two separate jails.
'In the future, we may consider selling Oxbow, but we are not at that point yet,' Jensen said.
Jensen said government is here to provide for the health and safety of the public and that''s what the Council is trying to do.
Last Tuesday, the Sheriff''s Office presented the Council with a plan to reduce the number of inmates, which included the following provisions:
-Release 20 more inmates on electronic monitoring.
-Limit federal inmates to 75.
-Prohibit warrant bookings unless the suspect has a minimum of three outstanding warrants, a warrant for more than $1,500 or wanted by an out-of-state jurisdiction.
-Hold out-of-county inmates no more than three days.
-Create a prosecutor review board to determine which inmates can be released for monitoring.
Cunningham said if these pre-implementations don''t help the problem, then the jail will move to a new plan.
One option would be restricting bookings to major offenses and keeping suspects accused of class B or C misdemeanors from being jailed at all.
'In other states, those who commit class B or C misdemeanors, are not jailed unless the judge orders it,' Cunningham said.
If that doesn''t reduce inmates, the jail officials will have to release more inmates on monitoring, he said.
The last option, which Cunningham said is their preference, would be adding another pod to the Jail, which would put 4,600 beds on the site.
The County Council says building an addition would cost approximately $26 million.
'But this a tough call political people have to make,' Cunningham said. 'If you build it, people will fill it.'