The St. Landry Parish Council mulled over the soaring cost of parish prisoners with no resolution in sight.
On May 13, the city of Opelousas closed its city jail, which housed 15 prisoners. Eventually five of those prisoners entered the parish jail.
Opelousas city attorney Travis Broussard said a short term repair for the Opelousas lockup would cost about $250,000. The price tag on a long term fix is about $2 million, he said.
The city’s jail was closed after the state Department of Health required repairs.
The Eunice city jail was under same health department scrutiny, but Eunice officials agreed to make repairs.
The bottom line is the city of Opelousas is out of the jail business, Broussard said.
“We do understand that if we close the jail naturally you would think the parish would have additional cost,” he said at Wednesdays’ Parish Council meeting.
“In Louisiana there really isn’t any law setting out any administrative regulations or procedural regulations with respect to a municipal jail,” he said.
Perhaps curious for Eunice taxpayers and officials is the Opelousas attorney’s continuous assertion that Opelousas operates the only city jail in the parish.
The Parish Council sought a cost-sharing agreement with city of Opelousas for prisoner costs.
“Does the parish have a cost-sharing arrangement with the municipalities? Eunice for example,” Broussard asked.
“We want the citizens to understand what you guys are facing and it is that all of our municipalities lean on the parish in the same way and Opelousas has been for the years the only municipality that was carrying its own weight and it is longer doing it,” he said.
At another point, Broussard said, “Why are we different than Sunset ... none of the other municipalities in the parish are doing this. So why are we the bad guys?”
And, “Why Eunice? Why aren’t they beating down Eunice’s door?” he asked adding that Eunice does not have a jail.
No one at the meeting pointed out to Broussard, who was accompanied by the Opelousas police chief, Donald Thompson, that Eunice has a city jail.
Thursday morning, Eunice Police Chief Randy Fontenot said, “We do have a city jail in Eunice, which houses 45 people. We currently have 15 parish prisoners in our jail. I hope they didn’t lose them when they abolished our jail in Opelousas, but we still have them here.”
The St. Landry Parish Sheriff pays the meals and medical costs for parish prisoners, Fontenot said. The twice-a-day meals cost about $5 per prisoner, he said.
City prisoners receive the same meals, but the city picks up the cost, he said. The city also feeds honey buns to all of the prisoners in the morning, he said.
The city also supplies all inmates with a care package, clothing and other expenses such as mattresses, he said.
Fontenot said Eunice is among a minority of police departments operating a city jail.
But a positive side of the jail is it allows the city to hold people rather than release them and relieve pressure on the parish jail.
“If we didn’t have a city jail, I could see people being upset,” he said.
Amanda Cain, parish government finance director, said the parish has seen its cost to house prisoners outside the parish rise from $5,000 a month to $16,000 in June. The parish had budgeted about $60,000 for a year of housing prisoners outside the parish.
Parish President Bill Fontenot said in a phone call Friday the parish jail has a capacity of 232 inmates and when it exceeds that number, the excess is sent out of the parish at a cost of $24.50 per prisoner each day.
The last group sent out of the parish numbered 29 prisoners, he said.
The increase cannot be completely attributed to shutting down the Opelousas jail, he said.
There have been three to five prisoners from Opelousas each month, he said.
Sheriff Bobby Guidroz and the district court judges work closely to keep a lid on the jail population, he said.
Parish Councilman Harold Taylor said it was immoral for the city of Opelousas to dump its prisoner population on the parish.
The city of Opelousas should help with the prisoner costs until a permanent solution is found, he said.
“The parish didn’t have fair warning,” he said of the shutdown in May.
Broussard said he has to explain to the Opelousas city government “what makes Opelousas different than Eunice.”
Councilman Timmy Lejeune said, “It is easy to just throw in the towell and bring the burden to the parish when we already have more bills than we can already pay.”
Broussard also cited statistics that indicate St. Landry Parish does not have enough parish jail capacity and that is underlying problem.
