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| Jail Needs Space for 900 Inmates |
| By dailycomet.com |
| Published: 07/14/2009 |
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Lafourche Parish jail needs space for 900 inmates By Raymond Legendre July 14, 2009 MATHEWS - Lafourche Parish will need a 900-bed jail to meet rising criminal-justice needs over the next 20 years, a consultant says. A representative of the National Institute for Corrections issued the recommendation Monday to members of the parish's Five Star Jail Committee. A jail that size would likely cost more than $40 million, Lafourche Sheriff Craig Webre said. He used the cost of the Nelson Coleman Correctional Center in St. Charles Parish, which opened in 2001, as a guidepost. Consultant Jim Rowenhorst's projections, based on jail and parish population statistics, reinforced the urgent need, jail-committee members said. The 15-person advisory panel will factor in Rowenhorst's suggestions when it presents its findings to the Lafourche Parish Council in November. The committee's report is to include payment options, size and holding capacity. Committee Chairman Rick Bouterie said the thought of building a 900-bed jail is "mind-boggling." "The amount of money it would take to build that jail and how we would pay for it staggers me," Bouterie said. "I hope that politically it can be accomplished." By 2030, Rowenhorst said, the parish would average about 600 prisoners daily and as many as 760 on peak days. A new jail would need 134 additional beds to ensure inmates are properly classified according to risk level and charge severity, he said. The current Lafourche jail can hold 244 prisoners. About 60 to 80 inmates are routinely sent to out-of-parish jails due to overcrowding, said Marty Dufrene, Lafourche's head of corrections. In comparison, the jail in neighboring Terrebonne Parish houses 618 inmates. Rowenhorst, with help from Dufrene, estimated that, through the use of bonds, sentence reductions for good behavior and court summonses in lieu of arrests, about 70 non-violent offenders who should be in jail are walking the streets every day. "The trends he projected were pretty consistent with what we expected," Webre said. "In some respects, they were maybe a little lower." Webre said he was struck by Rowenhorst's statement that Lafourche would be three years away from opening a new jail even if it had money in the bank to pay for it now. "That was a sobering realization," Webre said. Read More. |
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