From the Office of the Sheriff Sheriff Dennis L. Dotson

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For Immediate Release

NEWS RELEASE

Date: October 17, 2006

Today, Sheriff Dennis Dotson released an update on the recent opening of the female housing unit in the Lincoln County Jail. “The transfer and transition that took place in the jail population was handled smoothly and without any significant problems”, stated Sheriff Dotson.

There were several changes in the jail and inmate population that were implemented in the middle of August this year. The 129 bed capacity of the jail was increased to 141 beds by adding additional bunks in the male and female housing units.

The female unit is housing females for the first time since the jail opened in 1992. It is only the third time in the jail’s history that the housing unit has been occupied by inmates. The first time was when the Oregon Youth Authority contracted with the county to house juvenile offenders, but that contract was cancelled only after one year when the Youth Authority lost its funding. The second time was when a portion of the male population was transferred to this housing unit during the first half of 2005. That ended when five corrections deputy positions were no longer funded.

The inmate population has varied over recent years from 101 to 150 in 2001, back down to 129 in January 2005 and then down to 101 on June 30, 2005. Funding resources were the cause for each of these changes. Sheriff Dotson commented, “The exciting thing about the increase from 101 inmates to 141 is that it was accomplished by restructuring our staffing in the jail. This enabled us to fund additional corrections deputy positions to open the vacant housing unit without impacting the County General Fund.” “We are very pleased with the creativity of our members who developed and presented this idea to me.”

However, there was more good news when this plan was presented to the Board of Commissioners and a request for one additional corrections deputy was made. The Board was pleased to fund the additional position in order to provide for a safer working environment for the deputies in addition to limiting the deputy overtime burden.

The work release housing units remain vacant. These units were not designed to house the inmates that are occupying the remainder of the jail. These rooms do not have locks on the doors, they are separated by sheetrock rather than concrete blocks, and no lavatories were installed in the rooms. This space was designed to house people of little or no risk to the public and be released during the day to report to their place of employment or perform community service projects. The units still require supervision, but at a reduced level. The Sheriff’s Office is researching ways in which this space can be utilized for its intended purpose or converted to allow for the full-time housing of inmates.

Since 1992, two work crews have been created to ensure that community service sanctions imposed by the courts are performed. This program, coordinated by Community Corrections and the County Road Department, has been extremely successful. Recent electronic monitoring of sanctioned offenders has also proven to be very effective and much less expensive than housing the offender in our jail.

The $30.00 per day “Pay to Stay” fee has been implemented for sentenced inmates. This program will be monitored for its effectiveness. The expense of housing, feeding, and providing medical services and medications to inmates, as required by law, continues to escalate. Our hope is that the inmates who tend to return to this jail will select another alternative, preferably not committing additional crimes. Unfortunately for many, the jails in this country have become a welcomed alternative to homelessness and the inability to obtain medical services. Lincoln County is no exception.

Sheriff Dotson stated, “These and other changes in the Sheriff’s Office reflect our attitude that if you don’t like the results you’re getting, change what you’re doing, and that’s exactly what we are doing.”

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