Hoping to reduce repeat offenses, city to pay for three instead of two beds at Jackson County Jail

By Morgan Rothborne, Ashland.news

For the first time in eight years, Ashland Police Chief Tighe O’Meara recently requested an additional bed for city use at the Jackson County Jail. 

O’Meara said officers working downtown have seen a repetition of a particular problem. 

“We have run into situations where we want to keep somebody in custody because they’ve been a chronic bad actor, but our two jail beds are already full. … We’ve had people downtown, repeatedly acting disorderly, quality-of-life kind of crimes, and we’ve had them just be kind of cycled in and out,” he said.

The city of Ashland entered into a contract with the Jackson County Jail in 2016 to reserve two beds as needed at a cost of $100 a day. In the new contract, the price has risen to $110, a cost that can be absorbed in the department’s existing budget, according to a staff report for the Feb. 20 Ashland City Council meeting. The City Council unanimously approved the new contract for the additional bed as part of the consent agenda, and the agreement has been accepted by Jackson County, O’Meara said. 

The suggestion to seek an additional jail bed came from an officer working in the Enhanced Law Enforcement Area downtown. The ELEA is a roughly two- by six-block area from which repeat offenders can be expelled for up to a year.

The officer informed the chief they were having trouble with arresting people for disorderly behavior only to see these offenders almost immediately released. Individuals then could and did return to Ashland to repeat the same behavior, leaving officers without effective means of responding. 

Jackson County Jail Commander Captain Josh Aldrich said the most alarming part of the jail’s capacity issue is the way Jackson County is exceptional in the state. 

Of the 34 county jails in Oregon — including those with significantly larger populations such as Multnomah county — Jackson County releases the most offenders from its jail due to capacity issues. 

In the last seven years, the Jackson County Jail released 38,981 people because there was not space enough to hold them, Aldrich said.

The shift sergeants and corporals at the jail say they would rather leave release decisions in the hands of judges. But in the face of overwhelming capacity issues, staff are forced to decide who to release. Staff consider two main factors in that decision: severity of the crime and if the charges are with the circuit court system or the municipal court systems. 

From January to December 2023, Ashland police lodged individuals in jail 655 times. This number does not reflect unique individuals, but only the volume of times an individual was booked by Ashland officers, Aldrich said. Of these bookings into jail, 17 were for municipal court charges. 

Arresting officers can often make the decision, Aldrich said, if they want to file charges with the municipal court system or the circuit court system. Cities such as Ashland have a municipal court which is smaller and more agile than the overburdened circuit court system. For lesser charges — particularly the downtown disorder type of offenses — the municipal court can mean speedier justice for offenders, he said. But that also means those offenders are likely to be released at lightning speeds in the face of the jail’s capacity problem. 

“Disorderly conduct charges, assuming they’re sober or have someone who is sober who can pick them up, they’re probably going to be out really fast,” he said. 

The potential for repeat offenses and public safety is not the only problem, he said. The jail has also made strides to be a place where those who need resources can get them. 

The offenders committing the type of “downtown nuisance crimes,” Ashland officers are struggling with are also often people who, with access to the right resources, could turn their lives around, Aldrich said. The Jackson County Jail has made significant effort in recent years to become a place where those who need it are given wraparound resources. The jail has seen success stories where an arrest led to life-altering changes for troubled individuals, he said. 

But this same population also often becomes “resource adverse” and it takes time to make contact and build trust enough to offer resources. Jail overcrowding doesn’t give staff that kind of time. 

“Unfortunately, the offenders who might need it the most are in our jail, like three hours right now, because of how we’re having to turn them around so quickly,” he said. 

Aldrich said the city of Medford has a contract similar to Ashland’s to reserve bed space for low-level offenders to give staff more time to try to help. He said Ashland’s additional bed could help make the difference for the “frequent fliers,” who need the resources the jail can offer. 

The additional bed also represents an additional level of meaningful sanction for not only Ashland police officers, but Ashland Municipal Judge Pamela Turner, O’Meara said. Officers can detain problem individuals at the jail pre-trial and Judge Turner can sentence those individuals to jail time via the additional bed, he said. 

Ashland’s contract for bed space also stipulates that those given the reserved beds are checked on by jail staff to try to ensure the opportunity to reach a troubled individual is realized in full, Aldrich said. 

“You never know which time that offer will be accepted and the degree to which it will be accepted,” he said. 

The city of Ashland’s contract also allows staff at the Jackson County Jail to “override” the city’s claim to bed space as needed. Sometimes, for the greater good and public safety, a more violent offender may need to be held and disorderly conduct offenders released, O’Meara said. 

“They’ll try to make a good-faith effort,” to honor the contract as best as they can, he said. 

Email Ashland.news reporter Morgan Rothborne at morganr@ashland.news.