In new facility, Houston County struggles with unused jail space
CALEDONIA, Minn. — As soon as Houston County Sheriff Doug Ely won election in 2007, he knew he’d have to deal with an issue that has long divided residents of the rural, farming community: the new jail.
With enough beds for 84 inmates, the jail is so big and underused that people wonder if the county made a mistake by building it.
“We’ve heard, ‘Man, it’s huge.’ We’ve heard, ‘Well, the upstairs is big, why isn’t the sheriff’s office very big?’ I hate to say anything,” Ely said. “It started long before I became sheriff. It’s a long time in the making.”
Houston County isn’t the only Minnesota county with excess jail space. In the past decade, a boom in jail construction — sparked in part by state requirements that counties upgrade law enforcement facilities — has left thousands of jail cells empty across the state.
In the past five years alone, 25 county jails have either been built or remodeled across Minnesota, according to the state Department of Corrections.
The combination has also left many Minnesota counties trying to figure out how to make money on this unused space.
Each day, about a third of Minnesota’s roughly 10,000 jail beds remain empty, according to the Department of Corrections.
The excess space means a loss in revenue for counties trying to pay for new jail construction. That’s because counties pay each other to house inmates when their own facilities are at capacity.
Sheriff Ely is confronted by the county’s ambitious vision every time he walks through the jail’s heavy, mechanized doors.
The $17 million Houston County facility, which opened in late October, is state-of-the-art. It has an industrial-sized kitchen, commercial-grade washers and dryers, a recreation area, flat-screen TVs and video monitors.
On a recent day, the jail housed only six inmates, less than half its average daily population. The daily jail population ranges from 15 to 20.
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Minn. counties struggle to pay for empty jail cells | Minnesota Public ...
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St. Paul, Minn. — In the last decade, a boom in jail construction and dropping crime rates have left thousands of jail cells empty around Minnesota. The combination has left many counties in the state trying to figure out how to make money on this unused space.
Each day, about a third of Minnesota's jail beds remain empty. As of Nov. 30, 3,001 of the state's 9,853 total beds were unoccupied, according to the state's Department of Corrections.
In the last five years alone, 25 county jails have either been built or remodeled across Minnesota, according to the DOC. The jail construction boom happened in part because of state requirements that counties upgrade law enforcement facilities.
This excess jail space means a loss in revenue for counties trying to pay for new jail construction. That's because counties pay each other to house inmates when their own facilities are at capacity.
While some counties have talked about closing their jails, there's no easy solution to the issue of empty space, said Jeff Spartz, former Hennepin County commissioner and president of the Minnesota Association of Counties.
"There's a reluctance to close a jail even if you aren't operating at its most efficient point," he said. "Things could change in a couple years and then we've got a large expense to open it up again, and we're subject to a lot of criticism."
Regional cooperation is key, Spartz said. But even that's tricky, because counties are likely to disagree on the logistics needed to work cooperatively.