CKJT to design Franklin County jail expansion

By Joe Chapman, Herald staff writer

PASCO -- Franklin County officials hope to have new designs and cost estimates for a jail expansion by May so the county can ask voters in November to pay for it.

The county commission on Monday directed County Administrator Fred Bowen to put together a contract with CKJT Architects to prepare the designs and estimates by May 1, six months before the November election.

If the designs and estimates are acceptable, county commissioners would decide whether to ask the voters to approve a 0.3 percent sales tax increase to pay for the expansion.

CKJT will be asked to design a project to convert the existing jail back to a 112-bed maximum-security area and add a new minimum- and medium-security area with 225 beds. A 25,000-square-foot administrative space would be put on the second floor, half occupied by the county sheriff, coroner, information services and courthouse security departments and half by Pasco's municipal judges and prosecutors.

The addition would have a wheel-and-spoke design similar to new units at the Coyote Ridge Corrections Center in Connell, allowing corrections officers to see every cell door from a central station and oversee more prisoners.

Work on the existing jail would include replacing the roof, electrical, heating and air-conditioning systems. The booking, laundry and medical areas and kitchen would be reconfigured to accommodate the 225-bed addition.

The county wants the total cost to be no more than $25 million.

Bowen estimated the county could pay off that amount with a 0.2 percent increase in the sales tax and could operate the expanded facility with money from another 0.1 percent increase.

"We need to have some kind of a number in front of us before we even start discussing going out to the public about it," Commissioner Bob Koch, chairman pro-tem, said Monday. "If we can't get what we want for that kind of money, we're going to have to wait until some more money's available."

Franklin County's jail opened in 1986 with a little more than 100 beds, but its daily population now averages 180 to 190 prisoners.

The facility also has an obsolete design and needs frequent repairs, jail administrators say.

The county added extra beds to cells to double up prisoners and eventually tripled up some, using mattresses on cell floors. Two years ago, the county created more space by moving 30 to 40 low-risk prisoners into an annex for the work release program.

A 225-bed expansion would provide space for the demand expected for the next 20 years, officials say.

The county has spent more than two years exploring options -- assessing the jail's condition, convening an advisory committee, taking trips to look at other new jails and discussing the possibility of building a regional jail with neighboring counties.

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Tuesday, Mar. 10, 2009

CKJT to design Franklin County jail expansion

By Joe Chapman, Herald staff writer