Sheriff seeks control of jail when private agreement ends

LISBON -- Columbiana County Sheriff Dave Smith is welcome to bid on the contract to run the county jail when a private agreement expires, Commissioner Jim Hoppel said.
Smith has expressed an interest in returning the jail's operation to the sheriff's department.
Smith told Hoppel about his interest recently, Hoppel said. The sheriff was unavailable to comment Monday.
The sheriff's department ran the county lockup until about 1997, when the county contracted CiviGenics Inc. of Milford, Mass., to run the jail.
County commissioners have since renewed contracts with the company.
Columbiana County's lockup is the only privately operated county jail in the state, said Hoppel, who was an early supporter of privatizing the lockup and remains supportive of the arrangement.
Costs
The county saves about $700,000 annually having the jail operated privately compared with the previous expense of having the sheriff's department run it, Hoppel said.
"That's big money," he added.
CiviGenics charges the county about $48 per inmate, per day to run the jail. That comes out to about $2.1 million annually, Hoppel said.
It's unclear what CiviGenics might bid for a new contract. The company has said it's interested in continuing to operate the lockup, Hoppel said.
If the sheriff submits a bid for his department to run the jail and gets the contract, he'll be expected to live with that figure and not return to commissioners in the middle of the contract, saying he needs more money, Hoppel said.
He praised CiviGenics' operation of the jail. Hoppel noted that the company has passed state inspections of the lockup and has encountered no serious problems running the jail.
"If you compare us with other county jails, our record has been good for the last few years," Hoppel said.