Oct 6, 2002 3 min read

So here we are $1 million later and still there isn’t enough room in the Fayette County Prison system to house all the inmates. This week the county – at an expense of $40 an inmate – was forced to ship several prisoners to Washington County. This time the excuse is that too many women are running afoul of the law. On Thursday afternoon, warden Larry Medlock said the county had 35 women in custody, hitting an all-time high. Quarters again became cramped when law enforcement conducted a roundup of suspected drug dealers.

For several years the county’s general fund has been drained because Fayette was forced to board inmates in neighboring counties’ prisons when cells became overcrowded in the century-old prison.

An annex was recently completed, costing far more than projected, with the hope that all the county’s prisoners could be held here. That hope was short lived.

Now Fayette is not only paying salaries and benefits for the additional prison guards hired for the annex, but is strapped for space and cutting checks to its neighbors. This bleeding must be stemmed.

There is an urgency, but the commissioners shouldn’t rush headlong into spending millions more without reviewing the options. The commissioners have keyed in on a costly solution that entails extensive renovations and additions to the old prison. This might not be the only, or the best, approach. We have repeatedly suggested that a more comprehensive approach be taken.

The commissioners must examine whether squeezing more cells onto a small parcel in the middle of downtown Uniontown makes sense. The commissioners must also work with the judicial system to continue looking at alternative programs that work toward rehabilitation for drug and alcohol addictions, which lie at the heart of many of the criminal cases and add to the high recidivism rate.

Are inmates sentenced to serve terms in state prisons moved rapidly out of the county? Are the amounts of bonds reasonable to allow posting by those who don’t pose a danger to the community or are considered a flight risk? Is there a way to streamline the amount of time inmates spend idle in the local system waiting to go to trial? Is a separate facility for women needed?

These are just a few questions that call for answers. If the commissioners wish to finally grasp the extent of this problem, they could call for a prison summit. Invite representatives from the bench, law enforcement, district justices, the prison, drug and alcohol, probation office in to pull together a comprehensive plan to solve prison overcrowding once and for all.