The county is considering a new location to construct a replacement building for its undersized community corrections facility after a previous proposal was denied.
Plans to build a new community correction facility on 1.8 acres of land at the northeast corner of Hospital and Drake roads were brought to a halt last summer when the Franklin Board of Zoning Appeals denied the project because the proposed building was too large to fit on the property, city officials said at the time.
The county is again proposing plans to construct a new facility on land a couple of hundred yards away, between the current community corrections center and Hospital Road.
[sc:text-divider text-divider-title=”Story continues below gallery” ]
Click here to purchase photos from this galleryThe lack of sufficient parking spaces was the biggest concern with previous proposal. The new location will have a parking lot connected to the parking for the county jail, and the current building will be torn down and converted into parking space as well.
The building houses programs to help rehabilitate offenders and reduce the risk of recidivism, including work release, home detention, community service, day reporting and other rehabilitation programs. The current facility is too small and lacks the necessary room for services and staff, county officials said.
Another goal is to have more space to house offenders who are on work release, the plans show room for 160 offenders, up from the 90 spots available in the current building.
The project will cost less than $12 million, which is the maximum amount allowed before state law requires a project to go to referendum, and will likely end up around $9 million, Johnson County Commissioner Ron West said.
A replacement building has long been considered, and plans for a larger building call for increasing the number of inmates the facility could house, creating space for rehabilitation classes and adding office space for staff.
Community corrections provides a cheaper alternative to jail. The programs are also cost-effective, since they are funded by people going through them, West said.
“The quicker you can get programming to many of these people, the better off the community is going to be,” he said. “Putting them in jail and housing them in jail is costly at best, and there isn’t much in the way of rehabilitation in those facilities.”
Architects are currently preparing designs for the new center. The building will likely be either two or three stories, depending on the cost. The county hopes to get estimates later this month, he said.
The community corrections center is currently housed in what is essentially a pole barn, and the use of space is not optimal, Community Corrections Director Jason Cranney said.
The facility has 90 beds, 10 of which are for women, which is far short of the 160 he would like in a new building. All of the women’s beds are currently taken, and the facility often has a waiting list, Cranney said, due to more women suffering from drug addiction.
The proposed facility would have 40 beds for women. However, the space would also be flexible and additional beds could be added, if necessary, Cranney said.
The center can house 80 people on work release, and 50 are in the program now, which is typical for during the winter. The facility nears capacity usually during the summer months, Cranney said.
While all 160 beds in the new facility may not be needed immediately, Cranney said it is an appropriate amount to meet long-term needs.
“We hope we can build the facility and 30 years from now we aren’t completely maxed out,” he said.
In designing the new facility, the plan is to leave some space empty and unfurnished, so it can be designed to meet future needs.
Programs to help with drug or alcohol addiction treatment, which are often essential in keeping people from re-offending, are only available off-site. For offenders who may have lost their driver’s license or not have access to consistent transportation, getting to those programs becomes difficult, Cranney said.
“It is one of the big challenges,” he said. “A lot of these individuals have lost their licenses. They are biking or walking to treatment places.”
A new community corrections center would have room to host classes aimed at reducing recidivism, including addiction treatment and behavior modification programs, Cranney said.
“We will have a much greater chance of them starting a program, but also of them completing it,” he said.
West said blueprints for the building should be complete in about a month. The county can then request bids and get an idea of how much the project will cost. The county council will need to approve the project. The county has hired DLZ, a engineering consulting firm, to create the plans, and has paid them about $35,000 so far.
