County-City Showdown Looming on Jail Proposal : Overcrowding: Foes step up effort to squelch a controversial plan to further expand Theo Lacy in Orange. Supervisors are scheduled to vote today; an ‘explosive’ meeting is predicted.

SANTA ANA —  With the County Board of Supervisors scheduled to vote today on a controversial plan to further expand the Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange, opponents are stepping up efforts to squelch the project.

Orange city officials--who last week voted to sue the county over the plan--disclosed Monday that they have also decided to try to convince the state Department of Justice that part of the expansion is illegal.

And the Orange Political Action Committee, a local activist group that opposes the expansion, has retained Robert A. Curtis, a Mission Viejo councilman and attorney, to represent them in the pending legal battle.

“It’s a shame we have to get attorneys, but we’re very upset about this,” said Orange PAC President Carole Walters, a homemaker and 23-year resident of the city. “It just seems we’re getting jerked around by this jail situation, and we want (county officials) to realize people here have had it.”

A showdown looms over the issue today, with supervisors scheduled to review and likely to vote on a set of proposals released 11 days ago by the county administrator’s office as short-term fixes to the jail overcrowding problem.

“It’s going to be explosive,” Curtis predicted.

The Jan. 17 staff report included proposals for exploring more community work-furlough programs, electronic home confinement and other means of lessening the county’s swelling jail population.

But the focal point is the Theo Lacy Branch Jail at 501 The City Drive in Orange.

By the time ongoing construction is completed toward the end of the year, the facility is expected to house up to 1,326 inmates. But the staff report recommends that the county look to expand the jail still further, to more than 2,200 beds, at an annual operating cost of more than $10 million.

That prospect worries many in Orange. They say further expansion of the jail will hurt commercial development in The City Shopping Center area nearby and bring “undesirables” into the jail area--just a hundred feet from the Orangewood Children’s Home. And residents fear that the Sheriff’s Department may routinely bring more serious offenders into their neighborhood.

“The stakes are high for us,” said William G. Steiner, who has a dual interest in the issue as a city councilman and executive director of the Orangewood Children’s Foundation.

“It would be nice if we could move back from confrontation and approach things in a more reasonable way,” he said, “but there could be some fireworks.”

Among the supervisors, Don R. Roth--whose district includes Orange--has voiced sharp opposition to the plan.

And Supervisor Thomas F. Riley has questioned whether the county’s integrity would be damaged by pulling out of an apparent agreement in 1990 with the city of Orange to cap the number of jail beds at Theo Lacy. County officials insist that agreement was never binding because a required third party--the owner of The City Shopping Center--didn’t sign it.

But despite such concerns, insiders predict that the proposals will be approved by the supervisors today.

Board Chairman Roger R. Stanton brushes off suggestions from critics that the board put off action on Theo Lacy, but he is making no predictions about the outcome of the vote.

“I’m going into this with an open mind, but I think we’re obligated to act quickly on this,” Stanton said in an interview. “We’re obligated to find (jail) beds . . . and we don’t have many options left.”

Orange City Council members, meanwhile, worked through late afternoon to finish a letter to be delivered to the board today, expressing their “alarm” over the county expansion plan and urging its rejection.

“It’s a matter of integrity,” Councilman Mike Spurgeon said of the county’s attempt to break the jail bed cap set in 1990. “Can the county be counted on to honor its agreements even when it’s inconvenient to do so?”

Orange is exploring other avenues as well--chiefly the contention that the county cannot put 358 new beds in Theo Lacey through double-bunking, as proposed in the county staff report.

“They can’t double-bunk,” said attorney Susan Trager, representing the city. “It violates state regulations.”

Sheriff Brad Gates, who has been critical of the county report for failing to address long-term jail needs, said in an interview last week that he believes double-bunking could be illegal under a funding agreement the county has with the state for current Theo Lacy construction.

And Trager said she believes it would violate environmental regulations as well. City officials have already contacted state legislators to press the issue, and are preparing to formally contact the Department of Justice.

Orange officials have indicated that if the dispute winds up in court, they will spare little expense in litigating it--a process that could drain both city and county coffers during tight budget times.

“Even with the tough economy, we won’t let that stop us,” Spurgeon said. “We’ve paid our dues already so we’ll go to the mat to stop this thing.”