Commissioners criticized for slow progress on Monroe County Jail solution

Critics are blasting the Monroe County Commissioners for slow progress on constructing a new jail, which, the critics said, should have happened a long time ago.

Commissioners this week unveiled the latest location they want to investigate for a new jail: North Park, a privately owned area northwest of the interchange of Interstate-69 and Ind. 45/46 Bypass.

While critics, including the commissioners’ primary election opponents, are largely withholding judgment on the proposed site itself, they said the commissioners should not have waited so long, given the county has been under pressure for more than a decade to replace the aging jail.

“The county commissioners have known that a new facility was necessary for the past 15 years, but their response has been dilatory and dysfunctional,” said Jody Madeira, a law professor at Indiana University who is running in the Democratic Party primary against incumbent Commissioner Penny Githens.

Steve Volan, who also is running to unseat Githens, said North Park is "another terrible idea. Everyone in Bloomington was upset about the prospect of the Hospital moving to North Park, outside town, until IU Health changed its mind at the last minute."

Monroe County Council member Peter Iversen, who is running in the Democratic primary against incumbent Commissioner Julie Thomas, said the county should have built a new jail a long time ago.

“That’s a missed opportunity by the current commissioners,” he said.

Commissioners said last week they are now exploring the North Park site, on the city's northwest side, after having abandoned the former Thomson property, on the city’s southwest side. The reasons include negative feedback from neighbors, ballooning site prep costs and likely delays.

Thomas said the North Park site would allow the commissioners to move forward “relatively quickly,” if they can acquire the property, which is owned by construction firm Crider & Crider. The county already owns the former Thomson site.

County Attorney Jeff Cockerill said a lot of matters, including facility size and suitability of the North Park location, have yet to be determined. Facility cost also is unclear and depends on size, though Cockerill said a 400-bed facility would probably cost near $75 million. A 2020 study suggested the jail might need 450 beds by 2049. DLZ, the Chicago-based architectural firm the county has tapped to help with the project, referred questions to the county.

The county also has to determine whether to build space in or near the new facility for related county offices, including the sheriff's department, 10 courts, the prosecutor's office, the public defender's office and the probation department.

Githens said she would like to see everything co-located. She said a facility that would hold a jail and related county offices might cost near $150 million.

However, she said, before commissioners determine the jail's size and scope, they are waiting for county council members to signal how much money they are going to allocate.

"We need something from them," Githens said.

Court official raises concerns about transportation, support services

Monroe County Prosecutor Erika Oliphant said via email she did not have enough information to provide an informed comment on the North Park location.

“My primary concern is that whatever location is selected and whatever design is implemented adequately serves the needs of justice-involved individuals without undue risk to community safety,” she said.

Kyle Dugger, a public defender, said he has the same concerns about the North Park site as he did about some of the other potential sites, such as lack of transportation options and significant distance from courts and service providers.

The current jail, located downtown, allows people who are released from the facility to walk to the Bloomington Transit Center and service providers such as the Stride Center, Beacon, Friend’s Place Shelter and Wheeler Mission. For example, the Friend’s Place Shelter is about a 1-mile walk from the current jail — but about a 5-mile walk from North Park.

Dugger said lack of transportation options and support services can present enormous challenges for people who are released from jail. It’s not unusual, he said, for people to get arrested in August while wearing a T-shirt and shorts, and to be released at 10 p.m. on a winter night. The North Park area, which essentially is a field on the side of a highway, has no transit connections, restaurants or businesses where people could seek shelter or even use a restroom, he said.

Dugger said he also worried about the clash of philosophies regarding the new jail’s capacity — though commissioners have not decided how big they want to build the facility.

Opinions in the community vary widely on the matter, Dugger said, and include the commissioners and sheriff, who believe the current facility cannot be renovated. However, Dugger, who serves on the board of New Leaf New Life, which “was formed to address the unmet needs of people caught up in our criminal legal system,” said many people disagree.

If the current average daily population of the jail is 160, where do the commissioners expect the additional inmates in a 400-capacity facility to come from? Dugger asked.

“If you build it, they will fill it,” he said.

Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Phil Parker said the department is anxious to propel the long-delayed project forward.

“This sheriff agrees that there were obstacles that have presented themselves with (the) Thomson site, and we believe the North Park site is certainly a viable option and worthy of exploration,” he said.

Addressing jail conditions has stalled for 16 years

Commissioners are under pressure to get things moving.

About a year ago, Indiana Civil Liberties Union Legal Director Ken Falk chastised members of a jail task force for dragging their feet. In 2008, Falk had warned the current jail was overcrowded, dilapidated and dangerous.

He agreed then not to proceed with a class-action lawsuit filed against the county over jail conditions as long as progress was being made toward a new facility.

Sixteen years have passed. A temporary settlement capping the jail population has been renewed annually, keeping a federal lawsuit at bay.

"You guys are living on the edge here. The jail is past its effective life," Falk told members of the Community Justice Response Committee in February 2023.

He said years of talking and planning had produced no results and “hindered your ability to solve this problem. You need a new jail. Everyone knows that. The expectation of everyone in 2009 was there would be a new jail.”

The county must act, Falk said, or the lawsuit would proceed. "You've been given all the advice you need, and it's frustrating to me to see all you good people, trying to do the right thing, paralyzed."

Two months after Falk's comments, after nearly two years of contentious meetings, dead-end discussions, accusations and animosity, the commissioners suspended the committee.

Critics: Monroe County Jail process 'has been dangerously prolonged'

The commissioners’ primary election opponents laid a large part of the blame for the inertia on the commissioners.

“The process of finding a location for the new Monroe County jail has been dangerously prolonged, putting county residents and resources at risk,” said Madeira, who is running against Githens.

“A site should have been identified and a facility constructed years ago, at a much lower cost,” Madeira said via email. “Nor have the current commissioners been proactive in maintaining the current facility, though they are responsible for maintaining the jail’s physical structure.”

Volan, who also is running to unseat Githens, said via email the commissioners are proposing to build a jail outside of the city, against the advice of other county officials, including judges.

"A justice 'campus' is worse," he said. "It’ll take decades to build out, abandon both public transit and the $9 million garage they just built downtown, and isolate the justice system from public scrutiny."

"Because the Commissioners have dithered for 15 years, costs of construction and interest have skyrocketed," Volan said. "Instead of increasing suburban sprawl, a new jail should go on land they already control downtown. Then they can renovate or replace the existing center as a non-jail justice office building."

"They don't need 25 acres," he said. "They need to learn how to build in a city."

Iversen, the county council member running against Thomas, said the county jail should be close to public transportation and support services, as has been stated by judges and others who have spoken to county leaders.

He said the county also should listen to Sheriff Ruben Marté, who is urging that a new facility be built soon to remove jail staffers and inmates from the dangers posed by the current, inadequate facility.

“We need to get this thing done,” Iversen said.

Thomas said via email that commissioners have investigated three sites so far: Hopewell, Fullerton Pike and Thomson.

She said, "There are pros and cons for every site, and we are well aware that providing reliable and regular transportation will play a key role in selecting the final site (along with geotechnical and engineering studies, etc.)"

Githens said commissioners are trying to be deliberative and pointed out the commissioners would be farther along had it not been for the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused substantial delays.

In addition, she said, as commissioners investigated the community's needs, it became clear the facility should offer programming and treatment, which will require a larger footprint and more acreage.

"It's hard to find that ... within the city," she said.

The commissioner also said the North Park site will not present traffic concerns that neighbors at the Thomson and Fullerton sites raised.

Githens said the county is working on expanding transportation offerings between Bloomington and Ellettsville, which means North Park could be on a bus line. A new criminal justice complex that includes courts and related offices also could draw more businesses to the area, including restaurants that cater to the criminal justice staff, alleviating some of the concerns about current lack of infrastructure at North Park.

H-T reporter Laura Lane contributed to this report. Boris Ladwig can be reached at bladwig@heraldt.com.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: What critics think of Monroe County commissioners North Park jail idea