TOLEDO, Ohio — The Lucas County Commissioners announced Tuesday that they plan to build a new county jail on several parcels of land downtown just a few blocks west of the current jail building.
The county is buying 12 parcels of land for the project from the law firm Shumaker, Loop and Kendrick, commissioners announced. The properties are bounded by 12th Street, Southard Street, Canton Street and the alley just north of the law firm's building on Jackson Street.
The new $187 million jail will have 430 beds, plus 24 medical beds and a mental- health wing.
“We still want to manage up to about 370 persons at any one time," Commissioner Tina Skeldon Wozniak said. "That's about the average number of people that we have in the jail at this point.”
Lucas County officials have worked for years to come up with a plan to replace the county's Spielbusch Avenue jail, which opened in 1977.
For decades, the county has operated under a federal consent decree to reduce inmate population at the overcrowded facility and more recently officials have pointed out its structural deficiencies that don't allow for direct supervision of prisoners.
"What modern facilities are doing now is constant supervision," Lucas County Sheriff Mike Navarre said. "They design it so the housing units are large, and there's a correction officer stationed in the middle of those housing units. There's constant monitoring of the activity in that housing unit."
The new jail is expected to cost $187 million, about $10 million of which will come from a state grant announced in late April. The remainder of the project will be funded without a levy, commissioners said.
“The citizens do not want to pay for a jail separate from their traditional sales tax," Wozniak said. "We recognize that. So bonds, general fund, operational savings and state and federal grants.”
In April the commissioners said they planned to break ground on the construction of a new jail by the end of 2023.
Navarre told WTOL 11 that the new jail will save approximately $8 million annually in personnel costs. He said the new facility and the new supervision model will require less staffing. Current staffing of around 200 will drop to about 125. The sheriff said that is a significant chunk of the dollars that will pay down the bonds.
"In reality, that's how we're going to pay for the new jail because there will be a lot less people working," Navarre said.
At least the fifth potential jail site
As recently as late 2022, the commissioners discussed the site of the current Toledo Lucas County Health Department along Erie Street as a potential site for a new jail.
Before that, in 2018, the commissioners proposed building a $180 million jail complex along Detroit Avenue in north Toledo that would have included pre-trial inmates, post-conviction prisoners and a behavioral health solutions center.
The Detroit Avenue location was the third recent site county officials chose for the new jail after public outcry about two previous sites in south Toledo forced them to scrap plans and continue searching for a place to build the new jail.
But officials have discussed new jail sites off and on for years. In 2003 the commissioners briefly discussed building a new jail inside the wire at the state's Toledo Correctional Institution.
Keeping the jail downtown a priority
Voters rejected the levy in 2018 that would have funded the new jail planned for Detroit Avenue and, a year later, approved a ballot measure that requires the county to build a new jail downtown.
In mid-2020, the commissioners discussed the health department building as a site for a new jail. In June of that year, the county hired Poggemeyer Design Group to do pre-architectural work on a plan for a jail there. At the time the commissioners said they believed a three-or-four-story jail on the health department site would cost about $100 million.
Navarre has said he wants the county to build a new, downtown jail that does not require a tax levy for funding.
He also has said he wants the jail to house only pre-trial inmates rather than a combination of prisoners awaiting trial and prisoners serving misdemeanor sentences.
The commissioners said they plan to eventually tear down the current jail building, but have not yet budgeted for that demolition.
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