Despite groundhog, effort saves $10,000 in costs annually
By Joanie Baker, Messenger-Inquirer
Messenger-Inquirer
Graphics, calendars and soap: Pa. prison makes ‘em all
DAVIESS COUNTY, Ky. — The only thing stopping the garden at the Daviess County Detention Center from producing thousands of dollars of produce for inmates is a thief.
But don’t expect this red-handed tomato klepto to spend any time behind bars.
Because the groundhog stealing bites from the hundreds of bright red tomatoes and football-sized squash being grown to lower the jail’s food costs is spending his time, well, under bars.
For the past four years, inmates at the jail have been tilling and fertilizing a small farm on about an acre of land sandwiched between the jail and the river.
| “It "[The garden] saves us a good deal of money and it gives the inmates a sense of pride,” jail spokesman David Osborne said. |
Jailer David Osborne said he selects inmates with some farming background to earn good time toward an earlier release for helping produce fruits and vegetables that save the jail more than $10,000 a year.
Osborne said he sees the success of the garden and is looking to expand it another acre in the next year.
He intends to build a greenhouse on the plot to allow the orange-clad farmers a place to grow seeds for transplant.
“It saves us a good deal of money and it gives the inmates a sense of pride and accomplishment,” Osborne said. "... It’s a pretty cherished job among inmates.”
Each year the garden is enriched with a truckload of free compost from the landfill.
About three inmates begin working eight-hour days, six days a week to see everything from potatoes to corn pop up from the ground.
Osborne said the tomatoes are donated every year from Apollo High School’s FFA program.
This year, Jim Good has donated nearly 150 cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower to the garden, Osborne said.
“We’re excited because we should be able to have those things for Thanksgiving dinner at the jail this year,” Osborne said.
Jeff Holcomb, an inmate from Owensboro who works in the garden, said he had only gardened a little when he was growing up but has since learned from others how to grow for the masses.
He said he may consider farming when he gets out of jail, but thinks he will probably just start a small garden with his kids.
Holcomb said the crop has already fed the entire jail a dinner with corn on the cob.
“I appreciate eating it a lot more,” Holcomb said. “I enjoy it and brag on it ... we’ve never had any complaints. Some have even said it’s better than the donated corn” the jail has gotten in the past.
William Snow, who also works in the garden, said he grew up on a farm but has never had so much trouble with groundhogs the way they do at the jail.
Snow said one large groundhog actually sits at a distance and watches them work from the vantage point of one of his underground escape routes that go into the corn field, to the jail and under the large security fence. The inmates laugh at the “Caddyshack” techniques of the rodent.
Cpl. J.C. Greene said it even made its way back to the garden after it was trapped in a cage and released two miles away. Even the scarecrow -- dressed in an orange jumpsuit and striped inmate-style shirt -- doesn’t scare away this felon.
But Greene said despite the groundhog’s efforts, the garden has fulfilled its purpose.
“I think it gives the inmates a sense of work habit and responsibility,” Greene said. “And in some way pride to see the produce it yields.”
Copyright 2008 Messenger-Inquirer