Inside Report for October 30, 2009

• By DEBRA LEMOINE
• Advocate Florida parishes bureau
• Published: Oct 30, 2009 - Page: 9B

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Tangipahoa Parish taxpayers soon will face a dilemma on how to pay for more beds in the parish jailhouse in Amite.

Like its neighboring parishes, Tangipahoa Parish has had a jail crowding problem for many years.

The 526-bed jail receives an average of 500 bookings a month. Inmates awaiting trial routinely are let out without having to post bond and with only a promise to go to their assigned court dates, officials have said.

With no financial incentive hanging in the balance, some of these inmates don’t return for their court dates.

As a first step to address the issue, Tangipahoa Parish Sheriff Daniel Edwards has commissioned a study at a cost of $180,000 to determine what the jail needs to meet the current and future needs of the parish.

The study will examine how many inmates are booked into the jail, what kinds of crimes they are accused of and the reasons they are let out, Edwards said. The study also will address how many of them are released because of crowding issues and how many commit new crimes once they are released, he said.

Using that data, the consultants will recommend a course of action, Edwards said.

So far, the Parish Council has chipped in $40,000, and Hammond Mayor Mayson Foster has agreed to provide $20,000 to offset the sheriff’s cost of the study.

The sheriff is expected to ask for help from more of the eight municipalities that use the parish jail.

The study also will include an analysis of the 12-bed municipal jail in Amite and the 24-bed municipal jail in Hammond, which hold misdemeanor offenders. All felony offenders are sent to the parish jail in Amite.

Under state law, building and maintaining the parish jail as well as feeding, clothing and providing medical attention to the prisoners are the responsibility of parish government. Paying for the personnel to run the jailhouse is the sheriff’s job.

The parish government does not have the funds to build a jailhouse without going into debt, said Jeff McKneely, the parish’s assistant finance director.

The parish also did not have the funds to build a jail when the facility was built in the 1980s. At the time, the parish faced financial hardship, and voters rejected three tax proposals to pave roads. They were never asked to fund a jail despite a federal court order in 1972 demanding one.