ORDER NO. 20759
APPROVAL OF 5r~'1'IIVG UP ID1F~TING WITH
TWO ARCHITECTS ON THE EXPANSION
OF THE KERB COUNTY COURTHOUSE FOR
OFFICE AND JAIL SPPC~
On this the 20th day of January 20, 1992, upon motion made by Commissioner Morgan,
seconded by Commissioner Holekamp, the Court UNANIMOUSLY APPROVED BY A VOTE OF 3-0-1,
with Commissioner Lackey "ABSTAINING" to set up a meeting with I.laxey and Associates, Inc.
and Di Stefano and Associates, Inc. to discuss proceeding with the additional space
for jail and office space, with a discussion of estimated cost to be addressed at
a later date.
COMMISSIONERS' COURT RECESSED U'dTIL 1:30 P.M.
CONPiSISSIONERS' COURT CONVENED AT 1:30 P.M. and the following proceedings were had:
-l.4 Combined meeting with the Juvenile Advisory Board and the Commissioners' Court
to take into consideration the proposals set forth by the Advisory Board as it
pertains to juveniles.
~ 0 9sq. ~
JUVE,"VILE BOARD ADVISORY COUNCIL REPORT
CONCERNING JUVENILE Dr'TFdVTION CII~ITr.It
TO: Members of the Juvenile Board
The purpose of this report is to advise the Juvenile Board of the various strengths,
weaknesses, and alternatives available in regard to the detention of juvenile criminal
offenders in Kerr County. In compiling the records for this report, it is important
to note that the Juvenile Advisory Council has made an attempt to determine the stxez3gths
and weaknesses of the present Juvenile Detention Center in Kerr County, the alternative
of out-of-county incarceration of juveniles, and the construction of a new facility
in Kerr County.
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In preparing this report, manbers of the Juvenile Advisory Council have traveled
to Hondo and Del Rio to view other Juvenile Detention Centers, have researched the
existence of private grants through foundations to provide for construction costs of
a new Detention Center, and have interviewed present Detention Center personnel and
obtained Kerr County Detention Center statistics to determine the use and adequacy of
the current Kerr County Juvenile Detention Center.
The report is divided into three overall sections. The first section deals with
the present Juvenile Detention Center utilized by Kerr County. The second section
deals with the construction of a new Juvenile Detention Center in Kerr County. The
third section covers incarcerating Kerr County juvenile offenders in other counties,
such as Hondo or Del Rio.
Inasmuch as the Juvenile Advisory Council has determined tY~,at this is a-multi-
^-Faceted problem with no clear cut solution, the Council has made a number of proposals,
but is not reconmending that the Juvenile Board take any particular action.
GTRk3VGTHS AND ~ ~ . OF 'i'1-TF: F.SENm
KERR COUNTY JUVENTT,F DETENTION CENTER
Introduction
In determining the benefits and weaknesses of each proposal outlined above, the
Council primarily concentrated on three distinct areas: the benefits and weaknesses
of the facility, service and benefit derived by the juvenile offender and family,
and the costs and benefits to Kerr County and its citizens.
Strengths and Weaknesses of the Facility
The current Kerr County Juvenile Detention Center has a nLmil~er of positive
attributes with an equal, if not greater number, of significant detrit~tents.
The Juvenile Detention Center is attractive to Kerr County inasmuch as it is
available space, currently being utilized by the County and in operation. The current
Detention Center is centrally located and easily accessible to law enforcement personnel,
juvenile detention officers, and court personnel. It has a current system in place
PAGE 524
which provides for a full-time Juvenile Detention Officer, together with numerous
part-time staff, both male and female, that assures guidance and monitoring of
juveniles detained at the Center. The Juvenile Detention Center, in its current
operation, allows for the use of a part-time staff that is available upon short
notice to supervise the Detention Center at an effective cost to Kerr County. Another
positive benefit is that the staff is experienced, well-trained, and doing a good
job, especially in light of the physical limitations of the Detention Center which
will be discussed later.
The present location of the Center is beneficial to the Court system, law enforcement,
and the families of juvenile offenders. In respect tc the smooth operation of the
court system, the location of the Juvenile Detention Center allows juveniles to be
brought directly from the Detention Center to the courtroom without the necessity
~'~f added personnel, and/or transportation costs. Juveniles who are detained in the
Detention Center can be brought to the courtroom in a matter of minutes, thus allowing
greater flexibility to the County Judge, prosecutors and defense attorneys. Defense
attorneys have the opportunity to consult with juvenile offenders at the courthouse,
thereby decreasing costs to the County in court-appointed legal fees.
The present Juvenile Detention Center is beneficial to law enforcement in that
its central location within Kerr County allows juveniles to be transported easily
and dealt with in compliance with the Texas Family Code.
The location of the facility is also beneficial in that food and laundry services
are provided from the jail, creating a more efficient use of the jail kitchen and
laundry systems and cutting the expense to Kerr County.
PAGE 525
Families of juvenile offenders are able to visit and maintain contact with their
children, which is of vital importance in the case of a detained juvenile. By being
centrally located within the City, parents of juveniles with limited means are assured
of not being estranged from their children for significant amounts of time during
crisis periods. The current location of the Detention Center allows parents to stay
in touch with their child during the detention and adjudication process.
The child, however, in the current Detention Center, is not particularly well-
served. Due to the physical shortcomings of the Detention Center, the child suffers
in a number of ways.
To begin with, the child suffers in that the Detention Center is physically
dangerous to the child during transportation. It does not provide adequate housing
for the child, frequently is unsanitary, is repugnant in its smell, and also cannot
~""wuse the nwnber of offenders which frequently need to be housed. Some offenders
that need to be housed are turned away, which in the case of many, if not all,
juveniles is one of the worst possible scenarios.
Secondly, the children are not being given recreational opportunities, thus
creating a sedentary lifestyle.
Perhaps the most significant shortcoming is the lack of educational facilities
available. Currently, a juvenile in Kerr County, once he is detained, simply is not
provided for educationally and falls out of the educational process. At the Hondo
and the Del Rio Detention Centers, arrangetrents have been made with the school district
to provide for continuing education of their children. This txansfflxms detention from a
period of simply sitting and waiting to an opportunity for positive. benefit. Also, it should
be noted that the school districts in those areas provide food for the children during
the day. Additionally, at the Kerr County Location, areas for counseling of children
PAGE 526
by school counselors arc not available.
The negative aspects of the Detention Center are numerous. The physical limitations
of the facility are perhaps its greatest drawbacks and ultimately will be the most
costly barrier to the continued maintenance of the present Detention Center.
The current Detention Center is well past its probationary period with the
Kerrville Fire Marshall. In many respects the building is not in compliance with the
Fire Code and is considered to be unsafe. The Fire Marshall has outlined a number
of steps which must be taken to bring the current Detention Center into compliance
with the Fire Code. Several steps must be taken: construction of an additional
interior fire stairwell, installation of a grade II water stem and the attendant
piping to provide for additional water in case of fire, and construction of a fire
wall between the County Court Annex and the original court building. Needless to
'"say, these improvements would be very costly and cumbersome to complete. Without
the c:anpletion of said steps to bring the current Detention Center into compliance, it
is likely the Detention Center will face increasing problems with the Fire Code and
the eventual closure of the building. Historically, stopgap measures have been
utilized to bring the facility into partial compliance with the Code. Said measures
have been expensive for Kerr County and have not provided a complete solution. The
difficulties arising from the lack of code compliance should not be slighted in that
eventually a decision will need to be made and the problem confronted, or the Juvenile
Detention Center may well be closed.
Additional difficulties in terms of the physical plant exist. The stairs providing
access to the Detention Center are extremely difficult from a law enforcement perspective
when a juvenile beccenes unruly and combative. The stairs are unsafe, not suited
for transporting juveniles, and do not provide easy access to the building. The
~>robl~n with the stairs creates not only a danger to the child in transportation, but
also a danger to the officer. This exposes the County to greater liability and risk
PAGE 527
in the form of injury or the loss of life due to the dangerous nature of the stairs.
The lighting in the Detention Center does not provide sufficient light for reading,
observation, and daily activities.
There are only two detention cells, creating a logistical problem in the housing
of juveniles. specifically, nwnerous occasions have arisen when due to the gender
ratio in the Detention Center, offenders had to be turned away. In particular, when
there are too many males, then no female offenders may be housed.
The physical location of the Detention Center frequently creates noisy conditions
for the District Court belaa, and this noise has interrupted the orderly maintenance
of court procedures.
Further, the present Juvenile Detention Center has absolutely no facilities
available to provide for educational training, a problem which has already been
Discussed.
In regard to the physical limitations of the Detention Center, there is
little question that the cost to bring the Detention Center up to Fire Code Standards,
and also up to standard in terms of providing for an adequate number of cells,
adequate areas for both recreation and educational training, may be cost prohibitive
in light of Kerr County's needs.
Costs to Kerr County
As outlined above, the maintenance of the present Juvenile Detention Center
has been characterized by niunerous costs to the citizens of Kerr County without any
definite improvement. Most, if not all, of the money spent on the Detention Center
over the past years has been for stopgap measures to bring the Center into partial
code compliance and to the minimal acceptable levels of crompliance with the Detention
Center Laws. They have not, however, been positive sups toward the upgrading or
eventual canplete compliance of the Center. To bring the Center into compliance with
all necessary codes and standards, the cost would be prohbitive and in light of the
PAGE 528
space limitations, may not be efficient for the future needs of Kerr County or its
children. The Center will always be too small to house an adequate number of juveniles
and will most assuredly be too small to derive any financial benefit from the housing
of out-of-county juveniles, a potential source of income which has been utilized in
Hondo and Del Rio.
bJhile the Juvenile Detention Center is a benefit to Kerr County inasmuch as it
is space already provided for in a good central location, the cost to bring the Center
into compliance outweighs the Center's inherent positive aspects.
ATTACHE~~ NT "A"
INE'ORMATION AS TO Dh~PENTION FACILITY USE
JAN. - DEC. 308 active days
1989 57 inactive days
A. JAN. - DEC. 288 active days
1990 77 inactive days
An active day denotes a day when a juvenile was admitted and staff was required around
the clock. An inactive day is when the facility was vacant or someone was brought in,
but not detained (released to parent, etc.).
O('CUPANTS
1989 131 female days with a total of 58 females detained
1990 127 female days with a total of 54 females detained
1989 102 males detained
1990 113 males detained
t~'vd DETENTIOIQ CENTER
Consideration has been given to the construction of a new Juvenile Detention
Center in Kerr County. Just as the maintenance of the old Detention Center has
benefits and detriments, the construction of a new Detention Center also has its
strengths and weaknesses. The most significant drawback, of course, is the expenditure
~of approximately $100,000.00 to complete a new project. The positive benefits are
rnmierous.
PAGE 529
Facility
Obviously, the construction of a new Juvenile Detention Center would provide
a facility which is in compliance with all codes and detention regulations and would
provide an adequate facility to service Y.err County Juveniles. Ultimately, the
citizens of Kerr County benefit from a new Detention Center in that it provides the
County an efficient location to house juveniles, thus decreasing juvenile crime and
the difficulties associated with juvenile problems. Anew Juvenile Detention Center
would service the community in a number of ways. To begin with, the community would
benefit from the increased safety in that greater numbers of juveniles could be
efficiently housed.
As with Del Rio and Hondo, the Kerr County Juvenile Detention Center could
~becane a location for out-of county placements. This could be achieved in two ways.
the possibility exists for the contract placement of children from TYC and IIvS.
Such placements are currently utilized in other counties in the form of a long-term
contract. Many times this subsidizes to a great extent the operation of the facility
and makes it more cost effective. Further, Kerr County could capitalize on the lack
of a Detention Center in Kimble, Kendall, Gillespie, and Bandera Counties, providing
a Detention Center on a contract basis to those counties. The Hondo and Del Rio
Detention Centers both accept out-of-county placements and depend on those placements
for a great deal of the operating revenue.
A new facility would provide a recreational area, an educational area allowing
juvenile detainees to remain in the educational syst~n, and areas for adequate counseling
of the children detained. These are all to the positive benefit of the juvenile.
Additionally, the County would save money by placing the entire juvenile department
_.facilities within the new Detention Center. Thus, rental costs to the County would
be decreased inasmuch as the Juvenile Probation Office would be twused under one
PAGE 530
roof within the Detention Center, providing for greater efficiency and greater service
of the needs of juveniles at less cost to Kerr County.
A new Detention Center would house more children and alleviate the gender ratio
problems which are frequently encountered in the current facility.
Benefits to the Child
The child housed in the Detention Center would benefit not only from the improved
physical surroundings, but also from the increase in recreation, education, and counseling,
thus making the time period detained not simply a waiting period, but a period for
scene improvement. Parents would still have access to children housed in Kerr County.
The child would be safer in the new facility, having a more sanitary place available
and alleviating the current transporting problem, which causes health risks not only
~to the juvenile cffender, but also to the law enforcement personnel.
PresLUnably, the new Detention Center would be placed on land currently available
to the County, such as the County yards located at Hayes and McFarland. One benefit
of the current location of the Detention Center is its accessibility to the Court
system. This benefit could be carried forward by constructing a courtro~n within
the facility. Juveniles could, therefore, be detained and adjudicated in the Detention
Center without the necessity of transportation costs from the Detention Center to the
Courthouse and the risks attendant with the transportation of juveniles.
A new Detention Center would also be beneficial to law enforcement personnel
in a nwnber of ways. To begin with, having a good Detention Center in Kerr County
would be a morale boost to law enforcement officials in that peace officers would
feel that Kerr County has made a concerted effort to provide a good detention facility
for juveniles to be housed and officers would know that when they arrest a juvenile
.,offender, there is a place to take that offender and know that he can be detained.
This, in turn, creates greater accountability of the juveniles for their actions.
PAGE 531
The benefit to Kerr County is substantial in that the County will be well-served
by a new Detention Center which can adequately house juveniles at an effective cost
and perhaps gain extra income from the housing of other juveniles from other counties
and agencies.
The negative aspects of a new Detention Center are minimal. It is estimated that
a new facility would cost approximately $100,000.00 to build. The new facility would
have saw increased operational costs. Specifically, by not having the Detention
Center in the same location as the current one, there will be the need for kitchen
and laundry facilities. With the new facility, there is the likelihood of increased
insurance costs and the need for increased staffing. Further, a new facility would
not be as centrally located as the current Juvenile Detention Center; however, many of
the location problems with an new Center could be alleviated by placing a courtroom
""` n the Center.
A list of private foundations and grants which may provide all or substantial
amounts of funding for the construction of a new Juvenile Detention Center has been
prepared. If a commitment were made to contract a new Juvenile Detention Center, the
J. A. C. would attempt to secure funding through these numerous grants. The possibility
does exist that a Juvenile Detention Center could be built entirely from private funds
provided by foundations, thus provinding a new facility with Kerr County's only
incurring the cost of maintaining and operating that facility.
It must be noted that closing the current facility and committing the annual
expenditures to the contraction of a Kerr County Juvenile Detention Center is a
secondary option.
PAGE 532
OUT OF ~Ut~'PY INCARCERATION OF JUVENILES
The third option is that Kerr County do away with its Juvenile Detention Center
and not construct a new Center. The positive benefits of no Juvenile Detention Center
are as follows. Kerr County would realize a savings in closing the current Detention
Center with its attendant costs, risks, and code deficiencies. Kerr County would
realize an increased amount of courthouse space, which apparently is needed. Public
opinion would most likely be favorable in that it is a perceived attempt by Kerr County
to save taxpayer cost. Futher, the child may well derive two benefits from no Detention
Center in Kerr County. First, assuming the child was housed in either Del Rio or
Hondo, the child would have an educational program available. Secondly, the child
would be removed from his enviroment.
Although there are benefits to no Detention Center in Kerr County, there are
sane significant detriments to the loss of a Detention Center. Obviously, there
is a decrease in law enforcement efficiency, law enforcement morale, and accountability
of children. In the event that juvenile offenders are to be transported for detention,
there is the likelihood that an offender in Kerr County will not be arrested, detained,
and transported unless the offender has committed substantial breaches of the peace
or is a repeat offender. In short, in order to earn anout-of-county trip, it is
possible a child must create greater havoc in Kerr County before he is detained.
Needless to say, the logistical difficulties in that situation are numerous in the
event of an arrest at 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning. Community safety would be
compromised in that juvenile offenders would not be detained for many acts that
are serious breaches of the peace, but not of the significance to merit a trip of
100 miles.
PAGE 533
The Cost of maintaining a program to transport children is also significant.
At the present, there is no transport vehicle dedicated to transport juvenile offenders.
The cost of a vehicle, liability insurance, and a driver to deliver detainees for
detention is significant.
The Court System would be Beverly compromised inasmuch as a child could very
well be malting n~rous trips from other facilities to Kerrville to attend juvenile
hearings. The relationship between juveniles and their attorneys would also be
comprised inasmuch as an attorney would only be able to consult with his client
when the child is brought to Kerrville or would be forced to travel to him at a
greater expense to Kerr County.
Obviously, there would be a loss of jobs in Kerr County inasmuch as the part-
time staff currently existing in the Detention Center would no longer be employed.
THE ATTACHID JWENILE BOARD ADVISORY COUNCIL REPORT CONCERNING JWENiT.F. DETENTION
CENTER IS RESPECTFCTLLY SUBMITTED TO THE MENIBRnG OF THE JUVENILE BOARD THIS 22ND
DAY OF JULY, 1991.
/s/ Peggy Braun
Peggy Braun, Chairman
/s/ Peggy Heiss
Peggy Heiss, Vice-Chairnian
/s/ Preston Douglass
Preston Douglass, Secretary
/s/ Annette Butler
Annette Butler, Member
/s/ Howard Hollimon
Howard Hollimon, Member
/s/ Danny Cortez
Danny Cortez, N~nber
/s/ Tina Jobes,
Tina Jobes, Member
/s/ Buddy Collins
Buddy Collins, Member
/s/ Rick Perry
Rick Perry, Di~nber
PAGE 534