Juvenile lockup financing squared away

SANDPOINT — Bonner County commissioners have locked up the final slug of financing needed to construct a $4.6 million juvenile detention center.

“We’re going build it,” Commissioner Lewis Rich said.

The commission adopted a resolution Tuesday to borrow $1.6 million from the county’s solid waste reserve fund and pay back the sum with interest over time.

That funding will be paired with the $3 million from the county’s justice fund.

“We were able to do it without borrowing any money, except from ourselves,” Rich said.

The decision to dig deeper into the county’s reserves comes after the Panhandle Area Council declined in October to loan the county the final $1.6 million in financing because it would appear to circumvent the will of voters who did not want to pay for the project.

The county asked voters to approve a tax hike in 2009, but the measure was overwhelmingly defeated at the polls. In 2008, the county sought judicial confirmation of a lease/purchase agreement to build a juvenile lockup and a work-release center. A district judge, however, held that the financing arrangement was unconstitutional and it would have encumbered public property.

Pressure on the county to cease using its existing facility, a residential home on the sheriff’s office grounds, grew when the Idaho Department of Juvenile Corrections declined to certify the lockup because of structural and fire safety deficiencies. The Idaho Counties Risk Management Program continued to insure the existing lockup while commissioners searched for a solution to the dilemma.

If the existing facility were shuttered, youthful offenders in Bonner County would have to be held at regional lockup in Dalton Gardens. County officials estimate that arrangement would cost $1 million annually for boarding and transportation costs.

The county commission awarded the construction bid to Ormand Builders last fall to build a facility with at least 28 beds. The new facility would either be built at the sheriff’s complex or off Great Northern Road near Woodland Drive.

“I stuck my neck out politically a couple years back,” Rich said of his support of the replacement project. “I’m glad we got it done. It’s going to result in significant savings.”