SHERMAN — Grayson County commissioners took no action Monday on the far ranging possibilities for improvements at the Grayson County Jail.
However, Grayson County Judge Drue Bynum did brief commissioners on a meeting he, Grayson County Sheriff Keith Gary and Commissioner Gene Short had the with the Texas Commission on Jail Standards. He said they went to Austin in attempt to get the TCJS to allow the county to keep, permanently, the 49 bed variance it received several years ago. That variance allows the county to keep three inmates in spaces that should only allow two in some cells.
Bynum said the TCJS didn’t seem particularly receptive to that idea. However, he said, they did seem interested in helping the county solve its jail issues.
TCJS officials showed the Grayson County people some examples of how they might reconfigure the current jail to meet the county’s needs and steer clear of violating TCJS rules.
Monday, Bynum said TCJS officials are expected to tour the jail sometime in early April to help the county pin point the things that could be done to make the current location work.
Some of those included removing doors from some blocks of cells to make an open area that would serve as a space for maximum security inmates. Those inmates are the ones the county has to send to outside jails most often due to lack of space.
He added, however, that remodeling or reconfiguring the old jail would likely come at some cost to area tax payers.
Bynum said having the TCJS staff involved in the project will help the county know which TCJS suggestions it must follow and which ones it can follow less strictly.
“I walked out of the meeting feeling good,” Bynum told those who attended Monday’s Commissioner’s Court session.
Short agreed that the Austin meeting seemed to have yielded positive results, as did Gary.
During a public discussion period after Bynum talked, one man asked if the new options for keeping the jail downtown meant the east Sherman site on Ida Road was now off the table?
Bynum said nothing is off the table at this point, but “Downtown is a more doable option.”
A woman asked commissioners if the new discussions with the TCJS changed the deadline by which the county had to have something done about the jail. In a number of town hall meetings, both Bynum and Gary said the county probably had until August to do something about increasing the size of the jail or lose the variation. That variation allowed the county to spend less on beds for inmates outside the county.
Bynum said he doesn’t think that deadline is as pressing now as they thought it was during those meetings.
However, he said that doesn’t mean the county can just do nothing. Bynum said the county must get started doing something this year because over crowding isn’t the only problem at the jail. He reminded people of the repair problems at the jail.
