News on New Richmond City Jail

Council Vice President Ellen Robertson (6th District) and Finance Committee co-members Bruce Tyler (1st District) and Charles Samuels (2nd District) as well as Council President Kathy Graziano, Doug Conner (9th District), and Interim Council Member Betty Squire (7th District) attended the meeting.

This clip from Tuesday's Budget Work Session is the most significant description of the new jail that has been given to the Council.

Philip "Tony" Jones, Operations Manager, Facilities for the City of Richmond opens video discussing the proposed $250,000 in this year's budget for "stabilization of the [jail] building until we can build a new jail."

John Winter, Special Capital Projects Manager for the City of Richmond, Virginia discussed some design concepts and policy decisions that were going into the designing of the proposed new Richmond City jail. Mr. Winter said the total project cost would be $137.6 million. The rated capacity at the current city jail is 882, the inmate population varies between 1200 - 1500, usually at the higher end. The new facility would be built by 2013 at the current location and most of the old jail would be torn down. The new jail is proposed to have a rated capacity of 1032 and a key component of the jail would be the development of alternative programs to keep less serious offenders out of jail. This is to be implemented over the next 2 - 3 years.

There were about 30 people in the audience, all city employees whom I recognized for the most part. There were no other private citizens nor news media present at the meeting. Watch the video, it's only 16 minutes long.