Corrections official warns of crowding

Utah's prisons are in danger of overflowing if money isn't freed up during a special legislative session to build new beds, the head of the state's corrections department warned Tuesday.

Without immediate action, the prison system will be in a "serious housing crisis at the end of the year," Scott Carter, acting director of the Department of Corrections, told members of the Legislature's Joint Executive Appropriations Committee.

But Gov. Olene Walker has yet to decide whether to call a special session. A meeting with the Legislature's GOP leaders on the issue that she'd planned for Tuesday was postponed until Wednesday.

Carter's pleas for permission to use federal funds to build new beds in Millard and Beaver counties seem to fall on deaf ears Tuesday. Senate President Al Mansell, R-Sandy, said the proposal "seems really strange to me," given that Salt Lake County has an unused facility, Oxbow Jail.

The Department of Corrections attempted to buy Oxbow from the county earlier this year for $7 million to use as a women's prison, but negotiations for the 500-bed facility located at 3148 S. 1100 West faltered and finally failed.

Carter said some county officials never participated in the negotiations. "On the state's side, we were very interested," he said. That appeared to rile Mansell, a Republican from Salt Lake City. "What you're telling me," the Senate president said, "is Salt Lake likes that empty jail."

Both Mansell and House Speaker Marty Stephens, R-Farr West, said after the meeting they had not heard enough yet to warrant a special session on this or any other issue. "Unless there's good cause, I wouldn't support a special session," Stephens said. "I haven't heard it."

What Carter wants is the ability to use federal funds to contract for yet-to-be constructed jail space in Millard and Beaver counties. The counties have committed to build a total of 300 beds within a year.

The Corrections Department is projecting inmate growth at 250 annually, a rate that would fill the state's existing prison space by October. Besides the county projects, the department will be seeking nearly $15 million next year for a new facility at the state prison in Gunnison.

Other changes planned by the department would move women prisoners to existing units at Point of the Mountain by relocating male offenders to 170 contracted beds in several county jails.

The governor is familiar with the plan to use federal funds for facilities in Millard and Beaver counties, said her spokeswoman, Amanda Covington.

"It's definitely come up and she recognizes the fact that we have a need for beds," Covington said. "Corrections has come up with a solution she thinks is cost-effective and can also house the growth in inmates."