Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 4, 1993 TAG: 9307010438
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-4 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
Radford City Council approved its share of the $75,000 cost in a final reading Wednesday. Boards of supervisors in Giles and Floyd counties did the same thing the previous week.
Pulaski County has delayed its decision. Wythe County has discussed newspaper reports of the changed requirements but taken no action. The issue has not come before the Montgomery County Board of Supervisors yet.
All six localities had already worked with the New River Valley Planning District Commission to complete a needs assessment study earlier this year. At the time, that study was required to get the state to pay half of the construction cost of a regional jail.
But the 1993 General Assembly changed the initial requirement to a more expensive study with different information. And the participating localities must complete it by March to remain eligible for the state funding.
The Pulaski County Board of Supervisors last Monday authorized the Planning District Commission to negotiate with consultants on the cost of the new study, but delayed any decision on its financial participation.
The board will ask Pulaski County Sheriff Ralph Dobbins for an assessment of the pros and cons of a regional jail at its July 26 meeting.
Dobbins said last week that he would have a report ready by then. He said he had not been told the matter was coming before the board in June, but he has said the existing county jail would have to be expanded unless a regional jail is built.
The Wythe County Board of Supervisors met Wednesday but made no decision on continued participation.
Wythe County Sheriff Wayne Pike told his board much the same thing that Dobbins has said - that their county's jail would have to be expanded or the county would have to participate in a regional operation. He said the board might want to look at the feasibility of expanding the Wythe jail to take federal prisoners and be reimbursed for handling them.
The Pulaski County jail has been renovated to handle female prisoners and is being reimbursed by other jurisdictions that lack the facilities to house them.
"It drives me crazy," Pike said of the revised study requirements. "You spend all this money and don't see anything."
Radford Mayor Thomas Starnes said there has been discussion of where a regional jail could go, but that that cannot be decided until it is known what localities will participate in it.
"Once that happens, there will be some serious discussions," he said last week.
If all six localities participate, Pulaski County would be close to the geographical center of the region, County Administrator Joseph Morgan told the board last week. Pulaski County also has the most inmates in its jail.
The Governor's Prison and Jail Forecasting Policy Committee estimates that the number of localities' inmates will increase statewide from the June 1992 population of 10,604 to 14,026 by mid-1997. Many state prisoners are also housed in local jails, but the state is trying to transfer them out.
by CNB