Napa County supervisors disagree with a 2016-17 grand jury recommendation that the county should explore teaming up with Solano County to establish a regional jail.
The county is exploring plans to replace its downtown jail with a $128 million, 304-bed jail along Highway 221 near the Syar quarry. It is building a $16 million, 72-bed reentry facility for low-level offenders at the same site.
But these are all-Napa County efforts, not the Napa-Solano team approach that the grand jury advocates.
There’s precedent for the partnership, the grand jury said. For three years, Napa County sent some of its inmates to the Solano jail while the local jail underwent repairs from the South Napa earthquake and was remodeled. Solano County has three jails and extra capacity and is building an inmate vocational education facility.
“The concept behind regional jails is that the cost of construction and operation of individual jail facilities doesn’t make economic sense for small counties like Napa,” the grand jury said.
On Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors approved responses to this and other issues brought up by the grand jury.
Napa County will receive $23 million from the state to help build a new jail. Under state law, any jail the county builds with this state funding can house only Napa County inmates for 10 years, the Board of Supervisors response said.
Similarly, Solano County opened an $89 million jail in late 2014 using state funding and faces the same restrictions. Napa County inmates kept in Solano County must stay in the older jail, not the new facility.
No regional jail facilities exist in California, making it hard to gauge the potential cost-savings from this approach, the response said.
Finally, non-sentenced inmates who make up most of the local jail population under state law must be housed in neighboring counties. Napa County would face difficulties if it relied on Solano County to house most of its inmates and Solano County didn’t have enough space, the response said.
Supervisors and the grand jury had other disagreements.
“The employees and inmates of Napa County are at risk of physical injury due to understaffing and overcrowding at the Napa County jail,” the grand jury said.
Overcrowding and understaffing can create stress in a jail, the Board of Supervisors responded. But attributing these factors directly to increased risks of physical injury oversimplifies the issue, it said.
More violent and mentally ill inmates are also factors that can affect safety, the response said. Staff is trained to address mentally ill offenders. The county relies on overtime to ensure appropriate staffing levels and relies on court-ordered releases to prevent crowding.
The grand jury said that correctional officer retention is a chronic problem, resulting in high turnover and higher costs and risks. Napa County as of April 1 had 72 allocated correction officer positions and 54 filled, for a vacancy rate of 25 percent, the grand jury said.
The Board of Supervisors said the county has dealt with retirement losses for a few years, but that this should change as replacement correctional officers begin their careers locally. It also said recruitment and retention problems for law enforcement and corrections aren’t limited to Napa County.
“Many agencies are faced with similar issues as younger people are more attracted to work environments that are lower in stress and carry fewer risks,” the Board response said.
Still, the Board said, the county recently recruited eight correctional officers. Recent pay increases of 5 percent and benefit changes should reduce retention problems.
Napa County’s jail is run by the Department of Corrections. The grand jury recommended that the Sheriff’s Office run the jail, as is done in most state counties.
The Board of Supervisors disagreed. Napa County has one of two Department of Corrections in the state where the agency head reports directly to the Board, it said.
“Absent some compelling issue – which has not been identified – there is no compelling reason to consider a change in management structure at this time,” the Board said.
August 17, 2017
Napa Valley Register
By Barry Eberling
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