Summary

The agreement would provide three more years of service and additional jail beds for cities, and cost recovery for King County based on services provided.

Story

Agreement provides three more years of service and additional jail beds for cities, and cost recovery for King County based on services provided

Staff representing cities in King County have reached an agreement in principle with King County for the county to provide misdemeanor jail beds to cities through 2015. The agreement specifies the number of beds to be made available to cities, and, once finalized, will be available to all 37 King County cities for consideration by each jurisdiction's respective council prior to the end of the year.

The agreement would provide important misdemeanant jail capacity for King County cities through 2015, which allows more time to plan for new jail capacity. In partnership with the county, north and east cities continue to explore options for additional jail capacity as forecasts - including the most recent Seattle City Council analysis - show additional jail beds to meet both the cities' and county's needs will be required within the next 10 years. Most cities already contract with jails in addition to King County to meet some portion of their jail bed needs, or operate small jail facilities themselves. These additional contracts will still be needed as King County does not have enough jail beds to house all city misdemeanant inmates.

The existing interlocal agreement for jail services between King County, Seattle and 36 other cities expires Dec. 31, 2012. In August 2008, the county and cities re-opened negotiations on the jail services agreement to discuss extending the existing agreement beyond 2012.

"Reaching agreement on extending the jail services contract was one of my top priorities this year because of its importance to the entire region," said King County Executive Kurt Triplett. "It is critical for providing clarity and greater certainty for elected officials as they make policy and budgeting decisions, as well as for regional and local law enforcement officials, prosecutors, court officials, and the entire regional criminal justice system that depends on coordinated regional jail services. I commend all of the parties to this agreement for working through tough discussions with us."

"It has been my strong preference to have a regional approach for providing jail services to our city. This agreement gives us a more realistic time frame to pursue that option in partnership with other cities and the county," Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels said. "I want to thank the leadership of our neighboring cities and the county in working cooperatively on this agreement."

Signaling significant progress in those discussions, the contracting cities and King County have reached agreement to amend the existing agreement to:

• Provide three additional years of jail service to the cities through Dec. 31, 2015.
• Conduct periodic county review of inmate population data and forecasts, which could be used to increase the number of beds available to cities.
• Implement new rates for services based on the type of service provided to city inmates. The new rates will be instituted beginning in mid- to late-2010 and will be updated periodically over the agreement term to reflect changes in actual county costs.
• Maintain cities' commitments to participate in programs providing alternatives to secure detention and to remain engaged in planning for future jail needs.

For the final agreement to take effect, cities representing at least 70 percent of the 2008 average daily jail population of all 37 cities must sign. The target is easily met if the five largest jail services users in the north and east (Seattle, Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond and Shoreline) sign the agreement.

The Jail Services Agreement is scheduled to be finalized in the coming weeks. It will then be submitted to respective city and county councils for consideration.