Inside a cell at the Tippecanoe County Jail, Friday, Jan. 17, 2020 in Lafayette. (Photo: Nikos Frazier | Journal & Courier)
LAFAYETTE — Tippecanoe County stands at an expensive crossroads.
Does it warehouse low-level criminals and accused criminals by expanding the jail or provide treatment for underlying reasons commonly believed to be behind crime?
One path — warehousing criminals — requires a $32 million jail expansion, and some believe it will not resolve the overcrowding conditions at the jail because offenders will just fill up the new spaces.
The other path funds an estimated $7 million expansion of the community correction center on North Ninth Street so participants can be treated for mental illness and substance abuse.
“A significant number of our (jail) population are frequent fliers, … and a substantial number are nonviolent,” Tippecanoe County Commissioner Tom Murtaugh said.
“If we can get these people hooked up with mental health treatment or substance abuse treatment, that puts this (jail expansion) off,” he said.
Regardless of the choice that county commissioners and county council members make before the end of 2020, the Tippecanoe County Jail needs between $8 million and $10 million in upgrades to the current facility, Murtaugh said, citing a November jail expansion study by DLZ, an engineering and architectural firm.
Murtaugh and Commissioner Dave Byers seem inclined to expand the community corrections facility — basically doubling its size.
“We are good (at the jail) until 2035 … without changes,” Byers said.
By expanding community corrections, building spaces for in-house mental health and substances abuse programming, Murtaugh and Byers said they hope to reverse the steadily rising jail population. This, in turn, buys more time — ideally, many decades, they said — before a jail expansion is absolutely needed.
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