The County Council moved closer Tuesday to cracking open the mothballed Oxbow Jail in South Salt Lake to relieve overcrowding at the nearby 2,000-bed Adult Detention Center.
But Democratic Sheriff Jim Winder will have to hold his breath. The council won't decide until next week.
Even so, the council appears willing to open at least one 184-bed wing at Oxbow to avoid early releases like the one last month, in which the sheriff cut short the sentences of 14 inmates because of too few beds.
Meanwhile, the county has "maxed out" its alternative-treatment options.
Ankle monitors? All used. Day-reporting centers? Packed. Drug-treatment programs? Full.
"If there is a resource out there," county corrections chief Rollin Cook said, "we are filling it."
Given that reality, Councilman Mark Crockett urged his colleagues to support reopening an Oxbow wing within the next three to six months with an emphasis on providing treatment options.
"We need to do whatever is necessary," he said, "to make sure our residents are safe."
Crockett's message resonated with colleagues on both sides of the partisan aisle - who, because the move was not spelled out on the agenda, opted to wait a week before voting.
"We have always said that Oxbow is there as a safety valve," Democratic Councilman Joe Hatch said. "Maybe the time has come to open that safety valve, or at least be prepared to open it fairly quickly."
The question of whether to unlock Oxbow comes fewer than two weeks after overcrowding forced more than a dozen inmates out of the county jail. Early releases have happened before, but this one squeezed out more serious offenders, including some guilty of class A misdemeanors.
That represents a growing population pinch on the jammed jail, which previously released inmates convicted only of class B and C misdemeanors.
Yet GOP Councilman David Wilde wonders whether the county is clogging its jails with people who don't deserve incarceration. Of the 14 inmates pushed out last month, offenses ranged from failing to pay child support to intoxication to driving on a suspended license.
"I want a jail that is holding people who are dangerous people - [who], if they are out on the street, are going to be doing things we are worried about," Wilde said. "I'm not so sure that driving on a suspended license [is one of them]."
The cramped conditions at the county jail have intensified in recent years, prompting a budget proposal last fall to reopen the shuttered Oxbow. The price tag: $5.9 million.
Neither Mayor Peter Corroon nor the County Council supported that measure.
Instead, county leaders squabbled over $610,000 in fix-ups costs, intended to ready the minimum- to medium-security lockup for reopening. The GOP-led County Council denied that funding in a party-line 5-4 vote.
This year, times have grown particularly tough. Jail bookings climbed 10 percent in June and 2 percent in July, when compared with the previous year.
A recent Salt Lake Tribune analysis also showed that more than 10,000 offenders from April 2005 to April 2008 were arrested, taken to jail and released - without spending any time behind bars.
Now the County Council must decide whether a second jail is warranted. Does the overcrowding represent a seasonal spurt or a sagging economy? Or does it signal a need for more bunks.
That's a decision for next week - one that tilts toward unlocking Oxbow.
