JENNINGS — The City Council took the first steps Tuesday in formally closing the city jail and terminating the Civil Service-classified position of jailer.

An ordinance finalizing the closure and termination is expected to be adopted at the council’s March 10 meeting, Mayor Terry Duhon said.

“We are looking at shutting it down by April 1,” Duhon said.

The jail is owned and operated by the city and the Jennings Police Department.

Only one state inmate is housed in the 40-bed facility. That inmate will be relocated, Duhon said. All other inmates will be housed in the parish jail. Three employee positions will be affected by the closure, but no one will lose a job, Duhon said.

“We have a communications officer position that one of the jailers will slide into, and we also have a position open for a firefighter that we hope to get one of the jailers in that position,” he said. “The other employee has expressed a desire to take a break from working for now.”

City officials have been pondering closing the jail for some time as a cost-saving measure, Duhon said.

“Because we are having a new parish jail being built we can really no longer afford to run a jail for felony offenders,” he said. “For years we have ran the jail without any compensation for housing those inmates.”

Eliminating the cost of operating the jail will save the city about $500,000, he said. Those savings will help fund other necessary projects and operations.

“We were one of the few municipalities housing felony prisoners,” he said. “And for years we have taken on that responsibility unfunded, but we can no longer do that anymore. Our budget has shrunk to where we had to do something to fund the things that we are responsible for.”

The city has worked out a deal with other municipalities to house felony offenders until the new parish jail is built.

The Jeff Davis Parish Police Jury has also agreed to house misdemeanor offenders at no cost to the city for up to five years. After that the city will have to pay the Police Jury for housing the inmates.

The city plans to renovate the old municipal jail to house detectives and other police officers under one roof. The detectives division is now located in a separate building across the street from the Police Department.

The city jail was expanded from a 20- to a 40-bed facility in the early 1990s, according to former Mayor Greg Marcantel. The expansion included increasing the number of state inmates housed locally, with 15-18 being housed at one time, he said.

(MGNonline)

Karen Wink