Federal bureau of prisons needs all space it can get

Unless the federal criminal justice system has undergone a dramatic change in the last 16 months -- we have no reason to believe that it has -- prison overcrowding is as much a problem today as it was when Mahoning County Sheriff Randall Wellington notified federal authorities he could no longer house their prisoners.
No, Wellington wasn't being difficult. He was just facing up to the reality that the 50 federal inmates in the Mahoning County Criminal Justice Center were responsible for overcrowding. And given the fact that a lawsuit by prisoners was a very real possibility, the sheriff had no choice but to tell the U.S. Bureau of Prisons that he couldn't accommodate them.
That action in August 2002 prompted this appraisal from U.S. Marshal David Troutman: Prison overcrowding had become such a major problem that federal inmates from the northern district of Ohio were being moved as far away as Holmes and Ashland counties and to Milan, Mich.
Troutman, who had to scramble to find new space for the federal prisoners from Mahoning County's justice center, did not quarrel with Wellington's decision, saying the sheriff's first responsibility is to take care of the courts he serves in Mahoning County.
Financial boon
As we noted in an editorial at the time, Wellington would rather have not sent the federal inmates away, seeing as how the government paid the county $67 a day (it is now $69) for each one. They're usually housed in the county jail while awaiting arraignment in trials in federal court.
But we also pointed out that there was an obvious solution to the federal bureau of prison's dilemma: The 2,106-bed prison on the North Side of Youngstown that has been empty since July 2001 and could easily be converted to use by the federal government.
Sixteen months later, it appears that such an arrangement is in the offing.
Mahoning County commissioners last month approved a contract with the owners of the Northeast Ohio Correctional Center, Tennessee-based Corrections Corporation of America, to serve as a conduit for federal prisoners to be housed in the facility on Hubbard Road. CCA, which shut down the NOCC after the last of the 1,700 federal prisoners were transferred, will pay the county between $1 and $3 a day for each inmate housed there.
While the payment to the county will depend on the number of federal inmates turned away from the county jail -- the sheriff will determine how many he can accommodate -- the real benefit to reopening the private prison won't be realized until the U.S. Marshals Service in Cleveland decides to send inmates from other parts of the state to the North Side facility.
From where we sit, that decision is a given in light of Marshal Troutman's comments in August 2002.
Corrections Corporation of America has the ability to house more than 2,000 inmates in the private prison; the federal government has a need for those many beds and more. It's elementary.
Income taxes
But there's another reason why officials of the city of Youngstown, which would benefit from income taxes paid by prison employees, and Mahoning County should do whatever they can to ensure that as many federal inmates as possible are housed at the NOCC.
Ohio Sen. Mike DeWine, a Republican, has been unyielding in his demand that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons buy the Youngstown facility rather than build a new one. DeWine, former lieutenant governor of Ohio, has refused to take no for an answer from the bureaucrats in Washington and has even brought together federal government and CCA officials to discuss the future of the prison.
We're baffled by the bureau of prison's inability -- or refusal -- to recognize what a good deal this is for the taxpayers and for the federal inmate population.