Commissioner offers solution to shrink jail population

Lee County’s growing inmate population is forcing commissioners to find creative alternatives to building more jails.

During a recent budget workshop, Commissioner Bob Janes proposed a new county position that would coordinate with the county’s criminal justice and human services departments in hopes of determining the most effective programs to keep the jail’s population down.

“All I’m trying to do is get new thinking about how we look at human services problems in Lee County,” Janes said. “What we’re trying to do is get the biggest bang for our buck.”

The person hired to fill the criminal justice coordinator position would analyze all of the criminal justice and prevention programs to find out how successful they are.

Each year, the county pays millions of dollars to prevention programs, but it has no way to rate their success, Janes said.

“It’s very hard to determine the return we are getting for our money,” he said.

With the cost of housing each criminal at $22,000 per year and the number of inmates growing 20 percent this year alone, the county cannot afford to continue the status quo, Janes said.

After determining which programs are working and which ones aren’t, the county could shift funding around to make the most efficient use of its resources, he said.

“We don’t have enough money to be able to take care of every problem in the area,” Janes said. “Maybe we’re sponsoring some type of a program that is not yielding results and the money could be reallocated into another program where it is needed.”

Janes has been active for years in the human services area, but that doesn’t mean he knows all the solutions, he said.

“That’s the purpose of this position,” he said. “Maybe through looking at it like this, we can take some bites out of the apple and have some impact.”

Having one person to coordinate the county’s services would be helpful to those in the private industry, said Kevin Lewis, director of Southwest Florida Addiction Services.

Lewis’ agency gets funding from the county’s Department of Human Services to provide alcohol- and drug-treatment services. However, without a point person, Lewis’ employees have to deal several separate agencies, including the State Attorney’s Office, Department of Corrections, county probation and the Public Defender’s Office.

The coordinator position will help the county maximize its investments and make sure they are as focused as possible, Lewis said.

Janes’ idea already has support from at least one other commissioner.

“I think it will provide more of a responsibility-type approach to correctional services,” Commissioner Ray Judah said. “From a long-term standpoint, it’s a tremendous cost savings. It’s kind of a proactive, progressive approach that’s needed to minimize costs that are continually escalating out of sight in the law enforcement area.”

County administrators will review the proposed position to make sure it is not duplicating existing services, said Assistant County Manager Pete Winton.

The county already contracts with a consultant who does courts and correctional planning, Winton said.

However, the county is also supporting a lot more programs now than it did several years ago, he said.

“There is a lot going on out there so there certainly is a need to monitor it,” Winton said. “The question is, can we do that with existing resources or do we need another position?”