Richmond must revise jail plan; capacity questioned

Richmond will have to revise its plan to build a new 1,032-bed jail in the East End after it failed Wednesday to get a waiver of state design standards.

The Board of Corrections approved aspects of the plan but would not allow double-bunked cells to be built smaller, to the more lenient standards of the American Correctional Association.

One board member also questioned whether the city is planning a jail with sufficient capacity, saying she doubts that it will be able to reduce the jail population as projected with electronic monitoring and other alternative programs.

"Instantly, you have an overcrowded facility," said Cynthia M. Alksne, predicting the jail population would remain at about 1,300.

Mayor Dwight C. Jones' administration said it had prepared for the snag and was looking at options, including a slight expansion of the building's footprint, that could increase costs by possibly $1 million to $2 million.

Officials couched the estimates as preliminary but suggested they could be absorbed within existing budgets, requiring no further consideration by the City Council. The council, which has grown increasingly skeptical of the jail plan, gave a narrow and supposedly final approval this week.

"I don't see this as a big deal," said Christopher L. Beschler, the city's deputy chief administrative officer for operations. "This isn't something that's going to have a radical effect on the cost or the schedule."

The Jones administration intends to submit a new plan to the Board of Corrections next month. Before then, officials plan to work with state corrections planners as well as the city's consultants and design-construction team to finalize details and to determine costs and other impacts. Site work had been scheduled to begin in late December or early January.

"There is a (backup) plan," Beschler said. "We need to make sure all the costs have been vetted out by the contractors and communicated to the city."

Councilman Bruce W. Tyler, who has continually blasted the city's jail plan and its $116.5 million design-construction contract with the Tompkins/Ballard Joint Venture, praised the state board.

"In no uncertain terms, I'm glad we've gotten into an arena where objectivity is in place instead of cronyism," he said.

Council President Kathy C. Graziano, who has supported the plan, said she understands from the mayor's administration that the expected $2 million in additional costs can be absorbed by contingency budgets for the overall $134.6 million project. The city is seeking state reimbursement of about $30 million for the project.

"It's just never ending, isn't it?" she said of the nearly 2-year-old jail saga.

The Jones administration revealed in September that it would seek relief from state design standards in order to build the jail with a rated capacity of 1,032 beds, excluding 108 special-population beds, without additional cost.

Specifically, the city sought to build double-bunked, medium-security cells at 80 square feet as recommended by the American Correctional Association, not the 115 square feet called for by state regulations.

At the time, administration officials conceded that the city had intended to build a jail with a rated capacity of 1,032 beds, even though the project's request for proposals had effectively asked for a 924-bed facility. The required 108 special-population beds are not counted in the rated capacity.

On Wednesday, state corrections officials indicated that the request to build to ACA standards was unprecedented in Virginia, despite city officials' previous representations to the contrary.

State Board Chairman Peter G. Decker III said he appreciates that other states have embraced ACA standards but wasn't prepared to take the leap.

"If our standards change, we're all over that," he said. "We're the Board of Corrections for Virginia."

Overall, he and other state officials praised the city's jail plans and commended the efforts already under way to establish alternatives to incarceration.

But Councilman E. Martin Jewell said the revelations further contribute to his lack of confidence in the city administration.

"This is a sad day," he said, "although I'm very pleased with DOC bringing sanity to an insane process."