Gwinnett County should expand the use of inmate labor to save money and keep open a prison officials considered closing nearly two years ago, a new report recommends.
The staff report, obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, said it would cost Gwinnett $3.4 million in the short run to close the prison and add space at the county jail to house local inmates. The report also found it would take scores of full-time employees to replace the labor inmates provide.
“Simply put, closing the facility would not lower our costs,” County Commission Chairwoman Charlotte Nash said. “Rather, it would shift many of those expenses to other operational areas.”
Gwinnett is one of 23 Georgia counties that operate local prisons. The Gwinnett facility on Hi-Hope Road in Lawrenceville houses 238 county and 129 state inmates, plus 86 work release program residents. The county jail is a separate facility run by the Sheriff’s Department and houses about 2,700 inmates, most awaiting trial.
Gwinnett has budgeted $12.6 million this year for the corrections department, which runs the prison. To offset costs, Gwinnett charges the state $20 a day per inmate. It uses inmate labor for janitorial, landscaping, maintenance and other services at many county-owned facilities. And it contracts with other local governments to provide work crews.
Commissioners voted in 2009 to close the prison amid a worsening county budget crisis.
In the wake of that decision, a quarter of the corrections department’s 142 employees left for other jobs or retired. That forced the department to scale back inmate labor for lack of officers to supervise them.
Commissioners later reconsidered and asked the staff to study the corrections department.
The new report found the costs of closing the prison would offset any savings. The Sheriff’s Department would have to hire deputies and expand the jail, and the county probably still would have to pay to house inmates at other facilities around the state, the report found.
The county also would have to give up inmate labor. Inmates provided 356,322 hours of labor in 2008, before the staff exodus and a decline in state inmates. It would take more than 170 full-time employees to provide that work, the report found.
With fewer crews, inmates provided 110,640 hours of labor worth an estimated $1.3 million in 2010, according to Warden David Peek.
Among other things, the report recommends expanding the use of inmate labor to cut county expenses. It also recommends Gwinnett continue to house state inmates and perhaps seek more. And it recommends annually reviewing the amount charged to cities for inmate labor to keep up with rising costs.
Last year the Engage Gwinnett citizen panel recommended the county explore outsourcing corrections department operations.
Co-chairman Mike Levengood had not reviewed the new corrections report thoroughly. He said it appeared to make some good points. But he’d like to see a more thorough exploration of whether outsourcing some corrections department staffing would reduce the cost to Gwinnett taxpayers of operating the prison.
The County Commission is scheduled to get a briefing on the report May 17.
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