Construction of the new Gibson County Jail in Princeton is progressing. Steel beams are currently being erected and assembled for the cell blocks.
You can watch the process via webcam here.
While visually one big construction project, the new facility is really two work sites — site A and site B. Site A is further along in construction and it includes the sheriff’s office, administration, prisoner intake, dispatch center and others.
Sheriff Bruce Vanoven said contractors are running wire, heating and cooling and technology infrastructure.
“…a lot of the technical wiring as far as computers and phones, that's all starting to happen now,” he said. “We get the windows put in, I think things will really start taking off on site A, Site B, I'm very excited about.”
Site B is the actual jail section of the building of which they recently began erecting the steel structure.
He’s excited because areas that can promote inmate safety and maybe even rehabilitation are being expanded.
This facility will include four isolation rooms for high risk inmates instead of three, four padded cells for those in mental health crisis instead of one.
There will be more group holding areas which used to be called “drunk tanks.”
Vanoven said the new facility will hold 220 inmates. The current jail holds 120. The goal is to not surpass 80-percent capacity, which is something that happened previously.
He said this project stems from a 2019 lawsuit against the county, which alleged jail overcrowding. Vanoven became Sheriff in 2023.
The goal is to get the roof and walls on by the end of the year to start building the interior.
Vanoven said with the new building they’ll also have room for more programming.
“I'm excited to get programs back in like Celebrate Recovery, Road to Recovery, Alcoholics Anonymous,” he said. “Any of these 12-step programs, I can get in there to rehabilitate the thinking of these individuals who have been brought in for various crimes, if I can rehabilitate them even a little bit to set them on our way to recovery, we can change somebody's world. That excites me.”
The current sheriff’s office building and jail will be demolished after the new building is complete.
They broke ground in October of 2022 and hope to be moved in by October 2024.
His department, like many across the US, is suffering from low staffing numbers, which can exacerbate the overcrowding challenge.
He hopes to add more officers to adequately staff the new jail.
"We are designed to have 21 corrections officers, and we have six openings right now," he said.
"We're going to do this right. We're going to have adequate staffing, and we're not going to compromise safety or supervision."
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