Greene official gets calls for prison space
WAYNESBURG – Greene County Prison Warden Harry Gillispie continues to field calls from county officials far and near, inquiring about space to ease their overcrowding problems. During a meeting of the county prison board Wednesday, Gillispie provided the board with the prison’s 2002 report and said 10 female inmates from Butler County are staying in Greene County to help Butler County officials ease an overcrowded prison there. In the past year, inmates from Fayette and Erie counties also have been housed in Greene County, which now has an inmate capacity of 116.
Gillispie said he will travel to Bradford County next week to meet with officials from there and other neighboring counties to discuss how the Greene County Prison might be able to take inmates as space permits.
He said the county’s inmate population has not grown as fast as it did over the past five years, which means the prison addition that was completed in 2001 has more space available now than it did when then structure was first opened.
Fayette and Philadelphia counties also have contacted Gillispie in recent weeks, but neither county has sent inmates for housing. Fayette County paid $78,520 in rental fees last year to house inmates in neighboring Greene County.
As of Wednesday morning, 84 inmates were inside the Greene County Prison, a number that includes the 10 inmates from Butler County. Butler County owes $6,360 for inmates that stayed at the prison last month, he said.
In January, the highest daily inmate population was 83, with the lowest at 55, making the average daily inmate population 63 inmates, according to figures provided by Gillispie. The average daily population for 2002 was 79 inmates, according to a report.
Gillispie also reviewed the 2002 inmate report, which stated that 550 inmates passed through the prison last year, totaling 797 charges. Of those, 325 were first-time commitments to the prison, while 225 had previous records, making the recidivism rate 41 percent for 2002.
The warden said the recidivism rate dropped from almost 60 percent two years ago, but the number of parole or probation violators is not included when the rate was calculated.
According to his report, the average inmate age is 33 years old, and 213 of the inmates who stayed at the prison in 2002 graduated from high school, while another 73 inmates received their GED. Of the 550 inmates, 488 were male and 62 were female; 502 were Caucasian and 40 were black.
Most of the inmates who came through the prison last year came on charges of DUI, Gillispie said, although the number, 123, was slightly lower than the 129 inmates who came in on DUI charges in 2001. Probation and parole violators comprised 80 of the commitments in 2002, down from 110 in 2001, and the county housed 67 inmates for other counties last year.
The county received $173,440 in rental payments from Butler, Erie and Fayette counties to house inmates in 2002, and another $66,817 was paid for weekend and work-release inmates, giving the prison a total income of $240,257.
Gillispie said the cost per inmate jumped from $32 per day in 2001 to $37 per day in 2002, with the biggest cost coming from food service. He said the cost, though it has increased, is still lower than those in many other counties throughout the state.
The cost to house an inmate for a year at the Greene County Prison rose from $11,680 in 2001 to $13,505 last year. Gillispie said that amount is far less than the cost per inmate at any of the state correctional institutions, which he said spend around $26,000 per year per inmate.
Gillispie said the ability to house inmates within the county and house inmates from other counties has saved Greene County money and has made money, as well. He said that without the 2001 addition project, the county would be paying other counties to house inmates. Instead, that money is coming to Greene County.
“Last year, we made $173,000 that we would not have been able to make had we not built the addition,” he said. “We would have had to spend money to send people elsewhere.”
Gillispie announced that the new air conditioning unit for the prison is being installed this week, and he does not foresee any more capital expenses in 2003, only to maintain the systems in place at the prison.
The board will meet next on March 19 at noon at the prison.