Platte County officials are looking into options to place mobile jail units pioneered in Springfield, Mo. to Platte City to help deal with the overcrowding situation at the Platte County Detention Center.
Commissioners are scheduled to meet with representatives with All Detainment Solutions (ADS) on Thursday, June 23 at the Platte County Administration Center in Platte City. The meeting will not be streamed.
Missouri-based ADS created the first modular jail of its kind at the Greene County Detention Center in Springfield, constructing a series of tractor units and fusing them together in a 20-space parking lot at the existing jail facility.
According to Greene County sheriff Jim Arnott, the county was paying more than $2 million annually to house prisoners in other counties due to overcrowding at their jail. Platte County hit that wall this year and has been forced to send prisoners to Clay and Buchanan counties over the past several months, at a cost of about $50 per day, per inmate. Estimates costs for this year to house inmates elsewhere are up to $300,000, additionally nearby jails in Clay and Buchanan counties are also filling up fast.
The current facility was built in 1998 with about 150 beds. Over the years, about 30 more beds were added, but opportunities for real expansion were few.
Serious discussions about the need to expand the jail facility kicked off around 2012 with a report by Captain Randy Pittman.
In 2014, then-commissioners contracted Goldberg Group Architects to assess needs and come up with options – which included a $21 million 315-bed facility.
After the report of a commission-appointed study group – which included current district commissioner Dagmar Wood - concerns over the population projection data used by Goldberg and the price tag shelved the project for a few years.
In 2018, the commission hired consultant Bill Garnos, who reviewed the past jail studies and projected future needs. Late that year, he delivered a report stating the county could need to double its bed capacity over the next 20 years, to hold 376 inmates by 2038.
During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, jail populations dropped, in part due to mitigation efforts to keep low-level offenders out of the facility. Now, the in-custody population is again spiking.
Wood spoke on the matter at the Monday, June 20 administrative session of the Platte County Commission held in Kansas City.
“Typically these jail pods are set up on an adjoining parking lot to the jail,” Wood said. “We are also looking at possibly utilizing them in Futures, the basement of the current jail. There are additional site prep, utility, and operational expenses associated with these jail pods, however, I expect it will cost less than paying to house our inmates in other counties.”
Wood said the meeting was a preliminary investigation of the options, but the sheriff and commissioners remain open to other ideas.