Sheriff Garry L. McFadden wants to open three more units at Jail North in January, to get people off temporary beds in Mecklenburg County's crowded main jail.
He asked county commissioners Tuesday for $2,665,673 to run the units, 167 beds, from January through June. County Manager Mike Bryant said he supports the request and will bring commissioners an option in December to cover it with one-time money, which pays for this budget year only. The cost does not stop in June. "2.6 is only for six months," Bryant said. "So you have to annualize it, which would be 5.2 million for next fiscal year." Commissioners took no action Tuesday.
The county reopened part of Jail North in September to take overflow from the main jail, Detention Center Central. Central has a capacity of 1,791 people. On Nov. 6, it held 2,016.
In slides presented to the board, the Sheriff's Office listed three reasons for the new units: to reduce or eliminate overflow on stack-a-bunks, temporary beds set up in overflow space; to have room to quarantine housing units if disease spreads this winter; and to have space if one event brings mass arrests. The units can open once a construction project at Jail North is finished, estimated for Dec. 21. Personnel ($1,124,472) and medical services ($917,465) make up most of the $2,665,673.
The federal detainees now at Jail North will not help pay for it. Their revenue was already counted in the budget for the first phase, the September reopening, commissioners were told.
The request has already put something else on hold. A review by finance staff, requested by commissioners, found that reopening juvenile detention at Jail North would take $2.5 million more than is budgeted, Bryant said. When the sheriff told him a request for the jail's second phase was coming, Bryant said, "I said we need to pause any additional conversation relative to juveniles." Funding the adult jail, he said, is the county's obligation.
Commission Chair Mark Jerrell said he expected commissioners to support the money but warned that it "creates a structural deficit," spending that comes back every year without money set aside to pay for it.
Commissioner Arthur Griffin Jr., who said in September that the county would soon need a second phase if the trend held, said Charlotte's growth alone would keep pushing the jail population up, and that it would be "a costly proposition." "So I struggle to support this phase two piece," he said. He also said he was concerned about the people who would still be crowded into Central.
The office said the population may have reached a plateau. The daily average hit this fiscal year's high, 2,268, in September and fell in October. The office's scenarios for June 2027 run from 2,059, if the population falls 1% a month, to 2,414 if it grows 1% a month. If it holds above 2,300 without stack-a-bunks, or above 2,500 with them, the office said, it would seek a third phase at Jail North, four more units with 224 beds, and it is weighing those needs for the budget year that starts in July 2027.
"It's good to talk about it, it is good to write about it, but you need to come and see it," McFadden told the board.