New Jail Is Needed Now

Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona has the right idea in trying to make inmates serve their entire sentences. But jail overcrowding is a perennial problem that makes it difficult for officials to implement such a policy.

For years inmates have been let out early from county jails to make room for others considered more dangerous. Late last year jail officials said they had managed to virtually stop the practice of releasing inmates with more than three days left to serve. In 1998, nearly 6,000 inmates were able to use the get-out-of-jail-early card. In the first 11 months of 1999, the number dropped to 78.

There was a price to be paid, and a dangerous one at that.

On Thanksgiving weekend, dozens of inmates at the main county jail in Santa Ana brawled. Three deputies and eight inmates were bruised or cut.

Jail overcrowding increases the likelihood of fights. And Carona’s new policy has meant a reduction in the number of beds that are kept free to ensure that members of rival gangs are not housed close enough to take their battles from the streets to the jail.

Carona’s efforts to use the number of jail beds differently still amounts to trying to put six gallons of water in a five-gallon can. Orange County needs more jail beds.

More than a decade ago Orange County supervisors picked a site in Gypsum and Coal canyons, not far from Anaheim Hills, to house a massive new jail that would solve the problem of too many inmates and too few beds.

The jail never got built. Neighbors organized and led a campaign that easily defeated the proposal. Now the county again is seeking sites for a new jail.

A 384-bed addition to the Theo Lacy Branch Jail is about to open. An additional 384 beds are supposed to be ready for occupancy in a year or two. Other buildings at Lacy have been proposed, but money to build them is an issue. The Sheriff’s Department also faces the problem of obtaining funds every year to operate the jails once they are built.

People do not want a new jail built or an existing one expanded in their neighborhood. Several years ago, county officials attempted a major expansion of Lacy without consulting Orange city officials or residents, which was foolish. Orange understandably challenged the expansion in court. The city eventually compromised and allowed the county to add nearly 1,700 beds to the 1,300 beds then at Lacy.

The Sheriff’s Department’s attempt to add several thousand more beds at the James A. Musick Branch Jail also has been challenged in court by the neighboring cities of Lake Forest and Irvine. That expansion would be jeopardized further if Measure F passes in March, since it requires a two-thirds vote for approval of unpopular facilities such as airports, landfills and large jails in populated areas.

Despite the addition of Lacy beds, the county estimates that it needs several thousand additional beds. Since 1985, it has been under a federal court order to end overcrowding in its lockups. The Thanksgiving Day brawl should provide evidence that inmates are likely to be released early again if the county does not find a site and money for a new jail. There can be only so many additions. A new facility has been long overdue.

Inmates should serve their entire sentences. It’s what judges want when they impose jail terms, and it is what the public wants. One judge tried to convict Carona’s predecessor, Brad Gates, of contempt of court for setting inmates free early because of lack of room.

But a sentence to county jail rather than state prison generally means a convict has been guilty of a misdemeanor or has been sentenced to a year or less. If the choice becomes turning an inmate free several weeks before his sentence would be up or keeping him and running afoul of the federal order and prompting more violence behind bars, the sheriff unfortunately will have to resume the old practice of letting inmates go. The solution is to build the jail that has long been needed in Orange County.