By Kevin Krause
The Dallas Morning News
DALLAS — Nonviolent, low-risk Dallas County jail inmates work a variety of jobs inside the jail facilities, washing laundry, preparing meals and scrubbing the decks.
And if Commissioner Kenneth Mayfield has his way, they’ll also be working outside, cleaning up his District 4 roads and rights of way.
Mr. Mayfield wants to use jail trusties to clear debris and brush around road projects handled by his road and bridge crew. Currently, the minimum-security prisoners work only in the jails and in off-site county facilities where laundry and food preparation are done.
Unlike in Tarrant and Denton counties, Dallas County inmates haven’t worked in outside cleanup crews in recent memory, sheriff’s officials say.
Mr. Mayfield also wants to put one of his road and bridge crew members through the sheriff’s academy to become a licensed jailer so he can supervise several inmates at a time. That would be a first for Dallas County.
Mr. Mayfield has traditionally used inmates from Hutchins State Jail in southern Dallas County for the work, but he said the demand for inmate labor is high and fewer inmates are available.
“I’m just not getting enough state jail inmates to make it worthwhile,” he said.
Mr. Mayfield said he’s sent them to clean up around school districts, housing projects and a creek where drug deals were occurring. And the requests for inmate labor keep coming, he said.
The county budget office endorsed Mr. Mayfield’s proposal. And Executive Chief Deputy Jesse Flores said he supports the idea as long as the rest of county commissioners agree.
But Mr. Mayfield’s colleagues on the court say they want more details of the plan before they’ll sign off. Commissioner John Wiley Price opposes it, saying the jail barely has enough trusties to handle basic tasks inside the jails.
Mr. Mayfield said offenders who were sentenced to community service also have worked cleanup details in his district. But that labor pool dried up as well, he said, because judges are sentencing fewer people to community service.
Mr. Mayfield said that he’s used inmate labor since 1995 on a wide variety of projects, and that his plan will save taxpayers money while providing a needed service.
“It’s worked great. We’ve gotten a lot of projects done,” he said.
While chain gangs are largely a relic of the past, some form of outdoor work crews are used by a number of sheriffs nationwide. The work details are popular both with the public and among inmates, who enjoy the chance to get out of their cells for a few hours of fresh air.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Arizona gained worldwide attention by forming chain gangs for male and female inmates, complete with ankle chains. That, along with his Tent City jail in the desert, won him the unofficial title of “America’s toughest sheriff.”
Dallas County won’t have any inmates shuffling along in chains anytime soon, but Mr. Mayfield wants them to do more to work off their room and board.
Housing and feeding each Dallas County inmate costs taxpayers $44 a day, according to the budget office.
Hutchins State Jail has provided Mr. Mayfield with a guard in the past to watch the state jail inmates while they worked, he said. But because the Dallas County jail system is chronically understaffed, Mr. Mayfield wants his worker to be trained as a jailer.
Commissioner Mike Cantrell said he wants to see a detailed briefing on the matter with information about supervision of the inmates as well as what kind of work they will do and where.
He also said he wants to know what the county’s liability will be if an inmate is hurt on the job, harms someone else or escapes.
“It just needs to be briefed so we know exactly what the ramifications are,” he said.
Commissioner Maurine Dickey expressed similar concerns about safety and liability.
What Mr. Mayfield is proposing is already being done in Tarrant and Denton counties.
Terry Grisham, executive administrator of the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Department, said each of the four commissioner road and bridge precincts has sent employees to be trained as jailers.
Tarrant County inmates who are classified to work outside are sent to the precincts to pick up trash along roads and right of ways, he said.
“They will come and pick up however many [inmates] they need,” Mr. Grisham said.
Even Tarrant’s county clerk’s office, which runs a recycling program, has its own licensed jailer to supervise inmates working for that project, he said.
Many of the county’s inmates don’t qualify for outside work details. But for those who do work and stay out of trouble, it can mean time off their sentences. Tarrant County offers inmates three days’ credit for every day served.
That can turn a 90-day sentence into a month-long stay at the jail, Mr. Grisham said.
Although inside the jail, one guard must supervise no more than 48 inmates according to state regulations, on the outside it’s a little different. The preferred ratio is one guard for every eight to 10 inmates, Mr. Grisham said.
And safety isn’t a concern because none of the inmates qualified to work outside is considered a dangerous criminal, he said.
“If they take off running, we will wave at them,” he said.
Only about one or two have walked off a job in the last seven years, he said. That’s because most of them are facing short sentences for minor crimes and don’t want to add a felony escape charge, Mr. Grisham said.
Denton County Jail inmates can also be seen regularly cleaning up around roadways in commissioner precincts, dressed in black and white striped jail garb.
The work program, cut by a previous sheriff and then reinstated last year, was estimated to save taxpayers about $600,000 a year, said commissioner Cynthia White, who has her own certified jailers to supervise the inmates.
“The bottom line is, it’s beneficial to the taxpayers of Denton County,” she said.
But those two counties have not had the understaffing and overcrowding problems that Dallas County’s jails have faced in recent years, which have led to four failed state inspections in a row as well as federal government oversight.
Mr. Price, who leads a committee that addresses the jail population, said there aren’t enough jail trusties to go around.
“If you have difficulty managing them within the confines of the jail, how will you move them outside?” he asked. “They need them in the jail.”
Dallas County jail trusties are responsible for three categories of work, sheriff’s spokesman Michael Ortiz said. They work in the department’s off-site kitchen, preparing meals; they work in the off-site laundry, cleaning uniforms and linen in large industrial washers; and they clean and sanitize all areas of jails.
COUNTY JAIL CLEANUP CREWS
Using inmates for outside work details has not been tried in Dallas County in recent memory. But other sheriffs across the country have had success with such programs
— Currituck County, N.C. — Sheriff Susan Johnson started a volunteer outdoor work program more than a year ago. Inmates in black and white stripes collect trash from roadways.
— Butler County, Ohio — Sheriff Rick Jones, saying jails are too cushy, created a chain gang in 2005 for men and women, who clean up litter along roads while chained together.
— Cumberland County, Maine — Sheriff Mark Dion has inmates bright orange sweatshirts cleaning up trash along Portland’s streets and highways.
— Lake County, Ill. — Sheriff Gary Del Re created the department’s work-detail program in 1997 to give nonviolent offenders a chance to do something productive while serving their sentences. Inmates in bright red garb clean up trash along highways.
— Maricopa County, Ariz. — Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who calls himself “America’s Toughest Sheriff,” started his world famous chain gang for male inmates in 1995. The following year, women got their own chain gang. He put juveniles to work in chains in 2004.
Copyright 2007 The Dallas Morning News