By Rummana Hussain
Chicago Sun Times
CHICAGO — Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart announced Thursday he closed a 600-bed dormitory unit at Cook County Jail and plans to shut down another 300-bed facility next month in a plan that could save taxpayers $15 million a year.
Dart cited the shrinking inmate population within the last few years and various “management methods” for the closures, but said he has no delusions that the reduction trend might change.
That’s why he said he will keep the 300-bed Division III facility “mothballed” to be used for future overflow spikes at the jail.
The 600-bed facility, which was closed last month in Division II, had housed a kitchen in the 1950s. Half of it will be converted into a cafeteria, Dart said.
In 2002, the average daily capacity at the jail exceeded 11,000, and many detainees were forced to sleep on the floor or rotate bunk time. Currently, there are 8,600 inmates.
The closures also are allowing the shifting of 175 corrections employees to other posts. That move would save the county $10.5 million, which would have been spent for new hires, Dart said.
He said he hopes the reallocation of jobs will alleviate some of the need for roughly 500 federally mandated hires, which county officials agreed to Tuesday.
As part of a decadeslong court battle over conditions at the jail, U.S. District Judge Virginia Kendall recently ordered Dart to hire 210 new sheriff’s officers in 2010. There also were 295 vacant positions that needed to be filled.
So far, 100 new hires and 96 positions have been converted into officer positions, sheriff’s spokesman Steve Patterson said.
Patterson said county officials hope Kendall will consider the 175 reallocated positions as new jobs.
“I’m not going to pressure the judge,” Dart said. ". . . But I feel confident that things such as this have to impact those type of numbers.”
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