Sheriff's team on homelessness to cost more than $600,000

[Media]

Sarasota County’s new prohibition on outdoor lodging is designed to push homeless individuals to services and will cost more than $600,000.

The price includes two deputies, two mental health professionals and one sergeant.

Sheriff Tom Knight warned that the county must pay for the deputies to enforce the ordinance.

The plan is similar to the Homeless Outreach Teams run by the Sarasota Police Department.

Knight wants the county fund more programs to divert inmates from the Sarasota County jail that is at its operational capacity.

Full story:
http://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20...re-than-600000

[Unregistered]

"On top of those debates, Knight has floated the idea that the county fund more programs to divert inmates from the Sarasota County jail that is at its operational capacity. Otherwise, the county could face the prospect of paying $101 million to build a new jail in several years."

Wow, $600,000.00 is cheap compared to $101 Million for a new jail.

Looks like we are getting a great deal. Thank for saving the taxpayers millions of dollars!

[Unregistered]

"Commissioners also enthusiastically support those programs and prodded Knight and county staff to come up with some recommendations and proposed costs within three months -- in time to consider during the next budget.

“What I’m hearing from you is a more caring approach to people who have problems,” Commissioner Nancy Detert said. “I think that you probably get bored arresting the same people. I heard this in Tallahassee, not only from sheriffs but from judges. They know all these prisoners by the first name.

“We don’t mind funding (the programs), I would hope,” she continued. “We’re having a budget blip, but those things come and go. Frankly, it would be a savings, as you pointed out. This is better.”

Totally Agree.

[Unregistered]

Full story:
http://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20...re-than-600000

This is copied-and-pasted from the comments section of the H-T article:

Snip from the H-T article: “The Sarasota County jail is at its operational capacity.”

In addition to the above:
1. The felon population in the jail is increasing.
2. Felons require longer stays in jail (compared to the revolving door for misdemeanants).
3. The Sarasota County population hit 412,569 people in 2016 – and growth continues unimpeded. This population growth will commensurately increase the inmate population of the “at capacity jail,” thus risking an overcapacity scenario, which will violate Florida’s accreditation standards, as well as having legal implications in the future.

Sheriff Tom Knight – or someone with economic and competent foresight and administrative talent – needs to implement strategic planning right now, for the creation of a new jail, instead of waiting for the “at capacity jail” to exceed capacity. This strategic planning should have been implemented several years ago, but instead, Sheriff Knight lobbied commissioners for a new “sheriff’s campus” costing in excess of 110 million (about 5 years ago) – and which did not include a new jail – and which the Sarasota County commissioners appropriately denied.

Sheriff Knight is in a position to see this future problem, but he is either blind to the infrastructural need – or he does not have the necessary foresight and leadership that is needed for strategic jail planning. It is now 2017 and the jail is “at operational capacity.”

A good strategic planner avoids last minute governmental knee jerk reactions (i.e. economic-infrastructural emergencies) by addressing impending internal issues in advance. That is not happening for jail operations inside the Sarasota Sheriff’s Office.

[Unregistered]

Aging Sarasota County Jail at capacity- SH-T October 2017:


Sarasota County Commission discusses choices as inmate population reaches maximum


VENICE — Sheriff Tom Knight delivered a sobering warning about the local jail to Sarasota County officials on Tuesday.

Within two years, the aging facility will be full and essentially inoperable based on trends in the inmate population, he and top jail leaders said. That projection backs the county into two options: Reduce the jail population or figure out how to build and pay for a new jail, a daunting and undoubtedly controversial undertaking that would take years and upwards of $80 million to complete, Knight said.

“I don’t want this on top of you in two years when I walk in with a crisis,” Knight told the County Commission at its meeting in Venice. “This is the time to start a discussion about the cost-benefit analysis about programs we could use to avert that crisis we project is looming now.

“We’re at that crossroads. I can’t control everything.”

The warning is not new, but it does come with a new sense of urgency as the facility’s population has changed.

The county jail on Ringling Boulevard, constructed in 1975, has extensive capital improvement needs and, technically, has been full for years.

Although the facility can physically hold 1,020 inmates, it’s “operational” capacity is 867 due to different separation needs, such as by gender or by felony or misdemeanor. The population hovered in the 900s for several years, dipping below the operational capacity last year, and now sits at capacity with 870 inmates, Courts and Corrections Division Commander Maj. Jeff Bell said.

But for the first time, more inmates have been arrested on felonies than misdemeanors, which has serious implications for turnover in the facility.

“Arrest rates are declining” overall, Bell said. “What that signifies normally, of course, would be a smaller jail population. But you also will see not only does the arrest rate effect jail population, but the seriousness of those charges will have a significant impact as well.”

At 61 days, the average stay for inmates facing felony charges is almost three times that of those with misdemeanors, according to the Sheriff’s Office analysis. The average length of a sentence is roughly the same, at 103 days for a felony, excluding prison sentences, and 32 days for a misdemeanor.

The jail will run out of space rapidly should that trend continue, but Knight said he wants to avoid the need for a new jail.

He argues the trend also highlights the success of the past five years’ focus on programs for those facing misdemeanor charges, such as the work offender program, re-entry program, homeless outreach programs and specialty courts like the new comprehensive treatment court launched by Circuit Judge Erika Quartermaine.

The county invested millions in those programs, but the expenses pale compared with the borrowing that would be needed to build a new facility, Knight said.

The Sheriff’s Office proposed holding workshops to address drug and theft-related third-degree charges, which make up the bulk of the shift in the jail population over the past several years, Bell and Knight said. A significant portion of those also are inmates returned to the jail after violating their probation, which underscores the need to invest in rehabilitation programs, Bell added.

“You have a sheriff that is open-minded and believes in recovery,” Knight said. “Not just from a philosophical standpoint; I believe it’s cheaper than building cells.”

But those programs are expensive and require additional personnel, either within the county or the Sheriff’s Office, so the county needs to begin planning, Knight said. Just two weeks ago the commission approved its new budget, which took effect Oct. 1, by exhausting one of its savings accounts and vowing to make budget cuts during the year to restore that fund.

“You control a lot. You have the checkbook; let’s be real about it,” Knight said.

The commissioners agreed they want to pursue programs to reduce the jail population before serious consideration of building a new facility. Outgoing County Administrator Tom Harmer suggested the county staff will work with Knight’s staff to host a workshop on specific plans for programs to deal with the jail population.

“In all of these instances, there will always be the subject of money and we have to openly look at that square in the eye and see when that money is going to be needed,” Commissioner Alan Maio said.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/news/20...il-at-capacity

[Unregistered]

Thank You Sheriff Knight for your leadership and looking forward with new and innovative ideas.

[Unregistered]

Thank You Sheriff Knight for your leadership and looking forward with new and innovative ideas.

The TRUTH is not something trolls want to hear.

[Unregistered]

The TRUTH is not something trolls want to hear.

Hey buddy, not one single person in this thread has posted one single negative thing about Knight or the original newspaper article (at least not so far) -- and yet all you can do is come on this website to make a post saying that anyone who disagrees with Knight is a troll. That is remarkable. How much is Knight paying you to come on here to try and manipulate people? Knight and his regime have become 100% reactionary. Knight is now spooked and paranoid of shadows, while real issues exist that he is not adequately addressing. Buddy, are you happy now?

The one thing that Knight said he admired about Adolf Hitler was his effective use of the media to manipulate the public. Knight's attempt to imitate Hitler's manipulative tactics is not a good sign for the Sarasota Sheriff's office because manipulators tend to be secretive and unethical.