Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 28, 1995 TAG: 9506280028
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: RICHARD FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The county Board of Supervisors voted 4-3 Monday to back out of joining the Blue Ridge Regional Jail Authority with Lynchburg and Campbell County.
Now, however, some supervisors are worried that the regional jail may try to take over Camp 24.
"That's a concern of mine," said Supervisor Tony Ware, who voted to stick with the regional jail. "It sounds like we could be in trouble now."
The state Department of Corrections recently promised to give Camp 24 to Bedford County - with the provision that the county hand over Camp 24 to the regional jail.
That was before Bedford County quit the regional jail, however, and now nobody's sure what will happen to Camp 24.
"We don't have any idea," Bedford County Supervisor Bill Rolfe said. He said the county probably won't pursue the state's offer to take over Camp 24's lease if there's any question it possibly may go to the regional jail.
Lynchburg isn't saying if the regional jail will try a hostile takeover of Camp 24.
"I think it'd be premature to comment on that," Lynchburg City Manager Charles Church said, but "there are some significant issues related to [Camp 24]'' that will need to be addressed now that Bedford County is no longer a member of the regional jail.
Lynchburg faces a federal court order to reduce overcrowding in its jails. The Blue Ridge Regional Jail Authority proposes building a $20 million, 456-bed jail in Lynchburg. Unlike other regional jails, it intends to operate local jails to offset the cost of transporting inmates to court.
In the original plans for the regional jail, the 110-bed Camp 24 would have been one of those local jails. Lynchburg now leases 70 of those beds from Bedford County each month as a term of Camp 24's lease from the state.
Bedford and Bedford County have the use of the remaining 40 beds at Camp 24. At worst, Rolfe said, he hopes Bedford County will continue to lease Camp 24 from the state and share space with prisoners from the regional jail.
In addition to the beds at Camp 24, Bedford and Bedford County have 36 beds in their jail in Bedford. Bedford city and county usually house 35 to 40 prisoners a month in the 76 available beds.
In voting not to join the regional jail, Supervisor Gus Saarnijoki said the county has enough beds for several years of growth and joining the regional jail would add too many unnecessary costs to the county budget.
Bedford County Sheriff Carl Wells had a similar assessment.
Joining the regional jail would have cost Bedford and Bedford County about $3 million over the next 20 years. It also would have meant building a new sheriff's office and dispatch center across from the county-owned nursing home on the outskirts of Bedford.
Plans for the new dispatch center will probably be scrapped, Rolfe said. Instead, the county most likely will expand and upgrade its existing dispatch center, which will cost less.
by CNB