By Tim Weitzel, Iowa City
I will be voting no on the upcoming bond referendum to fund a new jail and sheriff’s office, not because I dislike law enforcement or because I think we shouldn’t have a jail but because there has been no dialogue about why this facility has to be built and why it has to be done right now.
I am perplexed at the current drive by elected officials past and present who are supporting a new jail without any meaningful input or discussion with the public. Rather than seek buy-in from the electorate, our Democratic electorate is pushing an unprecedented bond at a time when local governments are seeing a major decrease in revenue due to the actions of the Republican controlled legislature. When people say they have trouble seeing the difference between the two major political parties, I can understand the confusion. Despite there being very little similarity, both parties, from Bill Clinton to the present, have thrown money and incarceration at social issues that deserve a broader perspective than what amounts to as a way to forget racial and economic disparities in who gets locked up and who is allowed to consider the damage to their social reputation and seek forgiveness.
The Sheriff and County Attorney are asking the electorate to approve a $94.5 million bond, plus interest, on a facility that Shive Hattery suggests will function for about 25 years. The Shive Hattery report is a work that is entirely familiar to me, having spent a good chunk of time as a volunteer appointed to hear planning and zoning issues for the City of Iowa City. I also have done work as a consultant for the State of Iowa and the City of Iowa City. It is clear that the role of consultant is intended by our government to be one of getting approval for a project, one way or another. The chart showing projected increases in jail usage was made without any data on actual incarceration potential and somehow shows a rapid increase in incarceration based solely on projected population growth. The current data at the time of the report shows that incarceration rates were declining at that point. The needs assessment report for the new jail reads like the issue was already solved.
The web page for the proposed facility begins with the established fact, in their opinion, that a new jail is required. They say, “Johnson County wishes to construct a new facility for the sheriff’s office and jail.” It was never in question in the needs assessment that Johnson County has already decided they want a new jail and spent no time at all discussing a remodel or renovation of the current facility, the actual structural integrity of the building, or what will happen to it and the land purchased a few years ago across the street that was purportedly to provide space to build a new Sheriff’s facility. Everything in the document is framed as either “do nothing” or build a new facility. The subtext is that common sense dictates a new facility is the only solution. The idea that it is only reasonable and proper to proceed is to be understood. There is no middle ground and precious little time is spent on discussion of diversion or that a major function of the jail is holding people before they are even convicted of a crime and before a diversion is considered.
It seems like it would be ideal to say we can do both. We can build a jail and then discuss alternatives that would mitigate the need for the jail. But the idea that we approve a new facility before talking about the alternatives seems like the best possible example of placing the cart before the horse because horse doesn’t push a cart, it pulls it and the investment of $94.5 million, plus interest for a 25 year use-life surely is the issue driving the need and not the other way around. I encourage everyone to take a look at the Shive Hattery report and to draw your own conclusions, but again, I am voting no.
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