When the state ordered the release of 90 felons accused of violating their parole last week, the public backlash was swift and strong. Even Gov. Chris Gregoire, who learned of the episode after the fact, expressed her own outrage and ordered it stopped.
So the governor was thrilled – relieved might be more accurate – to accept a proposal from Snohomish County to house more parole violators in the county jail, a smart deal that gives the overburdened state Department of Corrections some breathing room and benefits the county in more ways than one.
Locking up parole violators – felons who have been released from state prison but have broken their release agreement in some way – was straining the state system beyond its capacity. Simply letting some inmates go was an ill-considered reaction that essentially told such folks that they were no longer accountable for their actions.
A good solution came when county Executive Aaron Reardon called the governor last week to offer more beds for parole violators at the county jail in downtown Everett for about $70 per day. Those beds would be freed by the reopening of the county’s mothballed minimum-security facility near Arlington, the Ridge (formerly called Indian Ridge), and moving low-risk inmates there.
This is an extension of a creative idea hatched in 2004 by county Corrections Director Steve Thompson. Thompson, then new to the job, had to figure out how to pay for operating and maintaining the downtown jail’s brand new wing after voters had twice rejected a 0.1 percent sales tax increase. His solution: use the new jail’s excess capacity to rent up to 200 beds to the state for low-risk parole violators.
It’s been a success all-around, easing the state’s capacity crunch, making maximum use of the jail’s space, and holding down fees for cities that use the jail. The average stay for a state prisoner at the county jail is just 37 days, Thompson said, and when their time is up, they’re transported back to where they were convicted.
The new deal, which still has some details to be hammered out, would generate an additional $1 million or so in county revenue. And the state has agreed to take the lead in recruiting an additional 30 county corrections officers, a task it will have to accomplish for the deal to work.
The state, of course, still must figure out how to hold all its parole violators accountable. For now, creative thinking by Snohomish County officials has bought it time to do so.
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