EDGAR COUNTY, Ill. (WAND) - Outsourcing inmates is now the plan for the Edgar County Jail.
On Monday, Edgar County officials heard back from their insurance company and learned they would not offer a policy to insure the newer part of the jail for housing inmates overnight.
Now, leaders are working on a plan to move forward. WAND News spoke with Edgar County Board Chairman Jeff Voigt to learn more.
"It's going to be hard work. We're going to have to all pull (it) together," he shared. "We have a lot of educating to do of the public and making sure that everybody understands our problem."
Voigt said priority number one is figuring out where to put their current inmates. He said the jail will house 30 inmates on average each day.
He said county leaders are already reaching out to jails and prisons in surrounding counties to see if inmates can go there. Roughly $380,000 will be set aside to cover housing and transportation over the next year.
However, Voigt said this obviously isn't a permanent solution.
"You know the attitude is sometimes, 'Well, they're criminals. So what do they deserve?' They deserve to have a safe, dry, warm or cooled place to be incarcerated that's not going to cause any problems or cause lawsuits," Voigt explained. "We need to have a safe place to have our staff work that doesn't cause them problems."
Voigt said many options are still on the table for the future of the jail, whether it's to renovate what's there, to partially tear down and re-build, or to start over from scratch. He shared that community feedback is encouraged every step of the way.
"We can always look back and say, 'Well, we should've done this, or we should've done that.' But we have the current situation to deal with, and we're going to try to be effective and use tax money and our personnel to our best advantage (for) the people of the county," Voigt said.
Another issue the county is looking to resolve is what will happen to current jail staff once most jail operations end. Voigt said the county is working with the unions on how to still meet their contract obligations. They'll discuss this more in a meeting on Friday.
The current facility will be covered under insurance for the next year to continue 9-1-1 operations, other Edgar County Sheriff's Office duties and also to keep prisoners in holding areas temporarily during the day while they await trial.
The last day for the current insurance policy on the whole facility is Nov. 30.
