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GoogleThe presentations were made at a meeting of Bedford County Board of Commissioners' courthouse and county property committee. The committee is still in early fact-finding and took no action on the issue Tuesday night.
Local sheriff's department officials have said that the jail is overcrowded, and court officials say they need more space and to be able to comply with new security regulations which some have said the current courthouse would never be able to meet.
SouthBuild LLC, a Memphis-based joint venture of an architectural firm and two contractors, discussed a similar conversion it is doing to an old Wal-Mart facility in Brownsville for the Haywood County justice system. The Wal-Mart itself is being converted into courtrooms, clerk offices, sheriff's offices and other support facilities, while a jail facility, because of the special needs of jail design, is being built onto the end of the building.
SouthBuild representatives Jim Lankford, Wayne Smith and Robert Wright discussed the logistics of doing a similar conversion to the Wal-Mart facility on Madison Street in Shelbyville.
Glasgow, Ky.-based Alliance Corp. did not discuss any specific sites in its proposal, but rather focused on presenting the advantages of using construction management services rather than bidding a general contractor.
Bedford County School System has used construction management services for all but one of its recent building projects.
When hiring a construction manager, the building owner pays an agreed-upon fee, and then the construction management firm bids out the actual work to subcontractors. Tim Geegan and Jim DeCesare of Alliance Corp. said this allows the county to choose the firm it would like to work with rather than being forced to take a low bidder of questionable quality.
The local school system has used a specific structure called "construction management at risk" in which the construction management firm guarantees a specific maximum price for the project and is responsible for any overages. When County Finance Director Robert Daniel asked about this, Geegan and DeCesare simply said a variety of construction management plans are possible, including construction management at risk.
Former Tennessee Commissioner of Transportation Bruce Saltsman is an advisor to Alliance Corp. and was present Tuesday night.
Downtown merchants and attorneys have objected at previous courthouse committee meetings to the idea of moving court offices away from the general area of the square, saying it would devastate the downtown business district by reducing its traffic.
But Lankford said that "going vertical" -- designing a multi-story facility to fit on a smaller lot near the square -- would lead not only to higher construction costs but to higher jail staffing costs. SouthBuild officials said that the design of a jail has a direct impact on how many jailers are needed to staff it; a poorly-designed jail can result in higher staffing costs over the entire life of the facility.
Sheriff Randall Boyce said during the meeting that if a new jail is built, the existing jail would likely be converted for use as the juvenile detention center.
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LOL . . building a jail and justice center on Madison Street will definitely help draw businesses back to that area. NOT!
Why build a new hospital 5 miles away from the largest population and put a jail within the largest population. Something just doesn't seem right here.
Why not reuse some of the vacant county buildings for a jail. Old Hospital, old schools.
Why don't we just build the conficts a Hilton Hotel?????
Thats just what we need, is to encourage more crime.And to make more comfy offices.
Tax payers have to work their butts off to pay taxes, so we can house more conficts and give them more room. Give me a break.The one they have would not be crowded, if they would do decent and not do any thing to get them in the jail in the first place.
I'm sure there are alot of other things that we can spend Bedford County's money on.
There are people who can barely get buy paying their bills and feeding their families. And have no medical insurance.
And there are people who want to make our cinvicts comfy.'Cause they are crowded????
Gee, the next thing you know, there will be people who will want to start a "Adopt A Coinfict Program"Bring them in your homes.And foster them.............
To you guys against the construction of a new facility. It's not all as cut and dry as you might want to think. Will it cost money, of course. Is it needed, YES! Until some of you actually have had to work under the current conditions of employment and strain of our current system you would never understand. You have one maybe two officers in the block with 30-40 inmates at any given time. Do a manpower study on that and we would be "Forced" into taking on more officers just to get the ratio down. This is not like teacher ratios. These guys have to fight these inmates daily and for little pay as it is. Imagine the stress of that.
The conditions of expansion have all been exhausted in previous years with the renovation of the old rock jail then the workhouse and we are still wall to wall. We can't help that people committ crimes and have to be placed in jail. But we have been riding the line as far as population goes.
Remember how the current jail had to be build. Through a lawsuit and federal court order. If we don't do something they same thing will happen again. Then it will no longer be ourdecision to make. They will come in and tell what we are going to do and what we are going to pay to do it. And of course that expense would be added to any inmate lawsuits the county would have to pay out.
Gotta think ahead of the game and plan for the future. Population is going to grow and there is nothing any of us can do about it.
1996 population was around 88-100. Todays ranges from 150-200 give or take on the "Weekenders".
Take that increase and multiply the average rate of growth over the next 5-10 years. If we don't do something the cost of building a new center of some type or another will seem like a nice afterthought. And the hindsight is 20-20 slogan will not apply. This informetion is as real as it gets and it is all happening now.
Look at the turnover rate for jail officers. more than 3/4 where hired in the last year. So we have new officers just getting started dealing with all this and don't have a clue how to handle it. There is no more "transition Phase" into the program. Pay is little and training funds barely meet minimum standards because of the lack of concern for the facility. I know it has always been the armpit of the county but there is no way around it. They have more rights locked up than we do outside thanks to federal law.
We here need to actually get with some of the few remaining decade plus employees that actually know something about the place and may have some rather good imput on need. But I don't think anyone has really bothered to even come check the place out and sit down and talk to these folks.
Kind of hard to know what your talking about from the outside looking in.
Maybe we can get some volunteers from those here who are against any move so they can actually be in the cell block face to face with the accused rapists, murderers and violent offenders like these young guys have to do day in and day out. May change some peoples outlook on the situation.
I believe the door is always open for our county commissioners to come take a tour. But I neve hear of any actually bothering to even come through the door with exception of Commissioner Brown.
Come on guys look at this from a safety standpoint. Or maybe they should just all quit and go home because noone really cares about them (It's happened before with some officers). Then who will man the jail?
Lower Taxes Please,
You are absolutely right. Why did they build the hospital 5 miles away? For some, it is quicker to drive to Tullahoma. The jail should have been built where the hospital is now.
Maybe we should do like Sheriff Joe Arpaio (In Arizona) who created the 'Tent City Jail'.
He has jail meals down to 40 cents a serving and charges the inmates for them.
He stopped smoking and porno magazines in the jails. Took away their weights Cut off all but 'G' movies.
He started chain gangs so the inmates could do free work on county and city projects.
Then He Started Chain Gangs For Women So He Wouldn't Get
Sued For Discrimination.
He took away cable TV Until he found out there was A Federal Court Order that Required Cable TV For Jails So He Hooked Up The Cable TV Again Only Let In The Disney Channel And The Weather Channel.
When asked why the weather channel He Replied, So They Will Know How Hot It's Gonna Be While They Are Working
ON My Chain Gangs.
He Cut Off Coffee Since It Has Zero Nutritional Value.
When the inmates complained, he told them, 'This Isn't The Ritz/Carlton.....If You Don't Like It, Don't Come Back.'
He bought Newt Gingrich's lecture series on videotape that he pipes into the jails.
When asked by a reporter if he had any lecture series by a Democrat, he replied that a democratic lecture series might explain why a lot of the inmates were in his jails in the first place.
More On The Arizona Sheriff:
With Temperatures Being Even Hotter Than Usual In Phoenix (116 Degrees Just Set A New Record), the Associated Press Reports:
About 2,000 Inmates Living In A Barbed-Wire-Surrounded Tent Encampment At The Maricopa County Jail Have Been Given Permission To Strip Down To Their Government-Issued
Pink Boxer Shorts.
On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing boxers were either curled up on their bunk beds or chatted in the tents, which reached
138 Degrees Inside The Week Before.
Many Were Also Swathed In Wet, Pink Towels As Sweat Collected On Their Chests And Dripped Down To Their PINK SOCKS.
'It Feels Like We Are In A Furnace,' Said James Zanzot, An Inmate Who Has Lived In the TENTS for 1 year. 'It's Inhumane.'
Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy sheriff who created the tent city and long ago started making his prisoners wear pink, and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic. He said Wednesday that he told all of the inmates: 'It's 120 Degrees In Iraq And Our Soldiers Are Living In Tents Too, And They Have To Wear Full Battle Gear,
But They Didn't Commit Any Crimes, So Shut Your Mouths!'
Way To Go, Sheriff!
Maybe if all prisons were like this one there would be a lot less crime and/or repeat offenders. Criminals should be punished for their crimes - not live in luxury until it's time for their parole, only to go out and commit another crime so they can get back in to live on taxpayers money and enjoy things taxpayers can't afford to have for themselves.
It would help if they would send state inmates on to state facilities instead of housing locally them to make money. The jail shouldn't be a money making business...it should be there to keep inmates who have committed misdemeanors or people charged with felonies whose cases have not yet been completed. I think the inmates have it too good in our local jails. They don't seem to mind coming back.
And if you want to know were the money was wasted, just ask the commissioners that built the jail to get us out of the federal oversight. They built a 120 bed jail and moved 118 into it the first day. How was that for backwards thinking?
Now is time to pay the piper or we are going to be looking at Federal Oversight again. And when the feds take over, they don't stop to ask if you have the money. They put things in motion and tell you that YOU WILL PAY no matter what the cost.