For the first time in nearly 59 years the Attala County Jail sits empty.
News that the jail was shutting down resonated throughout the county last week, leaving many to wondering what the fallout will be.
The county expects to save approximately $250,000 per year by shutting down the jail and transporting its prisoners to Leake County. The county along with the City of Kosciusko agreed to a contract with the Leake County Correctional Facility for housing city and county inmates at a rate of $19 per day per inmate.
“We felt like this was a good way to save the county a lot of money and not have to raise taxes,” said Tim Pinkard, Attala County Board of Supervisors president. “We really want to try this out and see if it works, but if it doesn’t, we will go back to the drawing board and look at building a new county jail.”
The Attala County Jail was built in 1957 and was one of the oldest operating jails in the state, causing many county officials to fear a potential forced shut down from the state. Plans for a new jail were nixed in 2014 after bids were above a projected cost of $5 million.
“Public safety is still the number one priority,” Pinkard added. “We have added deputies to the Sheriff’s Office to help with transport and we have discussed the possibility of building a new sheriff’s office, but we want to give this plan a year or two first.”
Without the jail or its jailers, the county will also see changes at 911-dispatch. The 5556 phone number to the jail will now route directly to 911 after 5 p.m. on weekdays along with weekends and holidays. In the past the city has paid for 911-dispatch with the county paying for the jail, but talks are ongoing at splitting the cost of dispatch between the two entities.
“I feel like we might have to add an employee or two with an increase in call volume,” Pinkard said. “We have also talked about the possibility of moving 911-dispatch over to the block of the former jail that housed state inmates.
With loosing state inmates, the county will also have to replace its inmate-work program, which was responsible for cutting the grass and maintenance on county property.
“We are going to have to contract out the grass cutting and we will have to get someone to help our maintenance man,” Pinkard added. “For the rest of this year we will probably get someone to cut the grass to finish the year out and then bid it out next year.”
The final state inmates were transported out of the jail Tuesday morning.
“We want to do what is best for our citizens and with four regional jails surrounding us we were able to get a very competitive price and save a lot of money,” Pinkard added.
