First, they say, reject a new lockup– then look for alternatives
By Tim Redmond
DECEMBER 17, 2015 — Four supervisors showed up on the steps of City Hall Monday to rally against a new jail, and a fifth send a message of support.
That means if one more supe votes with the five jail foes, this project will face if not total defeat then a major setback.
As I said yesterday, I don’t see the newly elected Aaron Peskin voting to spend more than $200 million in public money on a new jail. He told me that “everybody involved in this process has good intentions,” and that there ought to be a way to address bail reform and mental-health issues and still get the existing, inhumane County Jail #4 at Bryant Street shut down.
Which is inevitable: The Hall of Justice building, constructed in 1958, has to be demolished because it’s unsafe. So that jail will go, no matter what the board does. The issue is what to do with the inmates.
I asked Sup. David Campos, who is among the leading opponents, whether the state money could be used for something other than a jail, like a mental-health or drug-treatment center, and he said no.
“The first step is to reject this grant,” he said. He said the city needs to go back to the drawing board and look at alternatives – something that should have been done a long time ago.
“Why hasn’t the city done that analysis? I think the people in the Mayor’s Office have blinders on,” Campos said.
There are several items related to the jail on the agenda, but the grant money will be a key vote. “My grandmother said that all money ain’t good money,” Sup. London Breed, who also spoke against the project, said. “And this is bad money.”
Other speakers were Sups. John Avalos and Jane Kim. Kim noted that “the easy vote would be to take the $80 million. The easy vote is to assign poverty, substance abuse, mental health, and homelessness” to the criminal justice system.
Eric Mar sent a message of support.
Also on the agenda is the question of whether the city should buy the land near the Hall of Justice, which is strange since the city doesn’t have a contract to buy the land. It’s certainly possible to argue that the city needs that land for things now in the Hall of Justice, which has to be torn down, that aren’t necessarily a jail.
But first, the board has to vote on whether to authorize the city to issue $215 million in very expensive “certificates of participation” to finance the new jail. If that goes down, the rest is academic – maybe there’s a way to re-purpose the state money at some point in the future for something else, like a new mental health facility, but if the vote on the COPs is No, then the idea of a big new jail will be defeated for the moment. Like Dracula, it can always come back.
But the question then will become: What do we do with the maximum-security inmates, who have for the most part been charged with or convicted of serious violent crimes and are now in 1950s-style cages? Is there a way to spend (less) money renovating the existing modern jails for those inmates (at a time when we can find better alternatives for the less-violent inmates, some of whom need mental-health care, some of whom are just awaiting trial and can’t make bail?)
And it the board says No to the current plan, the Mayor’s Office and the new sheriff will have to look at the alternatives that so far haven’t been on the table.
