[01/08/01] A bill to house more state prisoners in county jails would save Mississippi tax dollars, but local officials say it would unnecessarily strap counties.

House Bill No. 315, filed Wednesday by Rep. George Flaggs, D-Vicksburg, would give judges the discretion to send nonviolent offenders sentenced to up to three years to county jails rather than the state penitentiary.

Under current laws, judges have the discretion to send misdemeanor convicts sentenced to less than a year to county jails.

“It would be a cost savings to the state because we won’t have to register them with the Department of Corrections,” said Flaggs, who serves on the House Appropriations Committee.

Under current laws, state prisoners are held in county jails during their trials and are transferred to the state to serve their sentences. Anyone sentenced on a felony conviction becomes a state prisoner.

Flaggs said it would be more cost-effective for the state to let prisoners sentenced to less than three years remain in the county’s custody, rather than sending them to the state.

“It costs more to house inmates in the Department of Corrections than in the counties,” he said.

But local officials fear county jails will not have enough room to take the state prisoners and that the state will not reimburse the counties enough money to make up the cost.

Richard George, president of the Warren County Board of Supervisors, said he could see no benefit to the county in the bill.

“All I see is a burden on our Sheriff’s Department and jail,” George said.

Warren County Sheriff Martin Pace said the problem with housing state inmates in the county’s jail on Grove Street is that the 128-bed facility was designed for short-term holding and is not adequate for long-term housing of inmates.

“I would have some concern for the inmates themselves,” Pace said.

On Friday, 84 prisoners were in the Warren County Jail. Of those, 13 were state prisoners.

The Department of Corrections pays the county $20 a day for each state prisoner housed and reimburses the county for prisoner medical expenses. The actual cost of housing a prisoner is $30 a day, Pace said, which is what Warren County pays to house its inmates in other counties.

“I would be opposed to any legislation that would put an additional burden on the county taxpayers,” Pace said.

Non-violent crimes are defined in the bill as those that do not involve the use or attempted use of force, deadly weapon, injury or attempted injury, or killing or attempted killing.

From 1994 until about April 1997, county prisoners were sent to other jails because most of the space in the Warren County Jail was used to house convicts waiting to be placed in a state facility.

In 1996, 80 of the 128 prisoners housed in the jail were state prisoners. The opening of state prisons in Marshall and Greene counties that year helped ease the burden and reverse the trend of overcrowding.

Warren County District Attorney Gil Martin said he believes a shift from state to county facilities would simply shift the overcrowding.

“I don’t think this will help our prison overcrowding situation much,” he said.

Flaggs, who is a counselor with the Warren County Youth Court, has filed another bill designed to reduce the cost of housing state prisoners in the Mississippi Department of Corrections.

House Bill 167 would reduce the number of non-violent criminals housed in the state penitentiary by making them eligible for parole earlier.

Under current laws, inmates are required to serve at least 85 percent of their sentence, but Flaggs said allowing non-violent criminals out earlier will reduce the budget for the Department of Corrections.

The state has three public state prisons, four private institutions and 17 minimum-security satellite facilities, with bed space for about 14,000 prisoners. There are about 20,000 prisoners in the system.

Flaggs has served as a delegate for Warren County in the House for 13 years.