Forum tackles cause of Vigo County Jail overcrowding

The Vera Institute of Justice is a nationally-recognized organization whose mission is to build and improve justice systems that ensure fairness, promote safety and strengthen communities. Vera works in partnership with local, state and national government officials to create change from within.

Vera's director of outreach and public affairs strategist, Jasmine Heiss, was invited to speak by the Taxpayer's Association of Vigo County as part of its effort to better understand what Vigo needs in a new jail.

The county is considering a 140,000 square foot jail with an average population of 307 inmates and a peak of 504 inmates.

The county's consultants estimate a $60 million construction cost requiring an annual debt service of more than $5.62 million. Annual operating and utility costs for a new Vigo jail are estimated to cost more than $6.89 million, an increase of more than $2.56 million over the current jail's costs.

Heiss said Vigo County is at critical point in its jail project and in deciding whether the county wants to continue the trend of mass incarceration or find alternatives that best serve the public's interest.

From the outset, Heiss painted a bleak picture of mass incarceration in the state, saying between 2016 and 2018, Indiana saw a 4.3 percent growth in incarceration rates, the highest in the Midwest during that span.

And while it would be easy for Vigo officials to look at growing jail and prison populations as a state problem, Heiss said Vigo has been a key contributor to those statistics.

On April 20, the Vigo County jail had a population of 291, Heiss said, a roughly 278 percent increase in jail population from just 30 years ago. The rate of incarceration has also increased by approximately 275 percent in that same span, or about 426 people in jail per 100,000 working-age people in the county.

"The Vigo County jail isn't that big, it doesn't look like a prison," Heiss said. "But the rate of incarceration here is actually higher than it is in both New York City and Chicago. And what that means is that your county is more saturated with the experience of being jailed than some big cities."

But the past is not a prologue, Heiss said, adding that Vigo leaders now have the opportunity to build a jail that factors in the failures of systems past, and includes progressive policies that reduce the county's growing rate of incarceration.

But what do those programs and policies look like, Heiss asked the audience.

"Vigo County is a space of tremendous opportunity," Heiss said. "You all have the opportunity to dig deeper into who's in your jail, about why and what might be done to change that.

"And you also have the opportunity to be deeply engaged in this forthcoming policy implementation and in trying to ensure that detention is a carefully limited exception."