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Show EwaDuattoom) Slated ff Daws Jail By GARY R. BLODGETT FARMINGTON Uniform Uni-form standards for operation of county jails throughout the state have been approved and evaluations of each jail will begin be-gin Friday with Davis County's Coun-ty's new jail being the first . AT A PRESS conference with Sheriff Brant Johnson and Sam Smith of the Utah Department De-partment of Corrections it was explained that the new jail standards will encompass more than 250 policies and procedures pro-cedures dealing with everything every-thing from jail facilities to administration of the jails. "There are 26 county jails in operation in the 29 counties and each wilt be under the same set of standards." said Mr. Smith. "It's a means of having all the jails operating in a similar manner. "OF COURSE there will be variation to the standards at the discretion of the individual sheriff, but all jails will follow the same guidelines something some-thing that hasn't been done in the past." He explained that each jail w ill have its "in-house" procedures proce-dures that will be evaluated by the sheriff of that institution. In addition, a three-member evaluation team will visit each jail beginning Friday in Farm-ington Farm-ington and concluding in about six months. "WE'LL VISIT jails of northern Utah Weber. Davis. Cache, Box Elder and Rich counties first," said Mr. Smith. "By visiting at least one jail per week, we'll be completed within six months." He said there are 250 standards stan-dards and procedures that jails will be asked to follow, but emphasized that the program will be carried out on a voluntary volun-tary basis. "WE ONLY want to make suggestions, not try to dictate procedures." said Sheriff Johnson, who is the newly elected president of the Utah Sheriffs' Association. He noted that all members of the Sheriff" s Association were im favor of the standards and procedures pro-cedures manual. Mr. Smith emphasized that the proposed standards exceed ex-ceed the minimum rights of offenders and in no way should violate the rights of an inmate. HE SAID the standards manual makes recommendations recommenda-tions for administration of the-jail, the-jail, hiring and training of jail preparation of food, personnel, person-nel, security and safety, discipline, disci-pline, medical treatment offered, recreation for in-, in-, mates, work release programs, rules and regulations to be followed fol-lowed by inmates, etc. t "We realize that jails are not hotels, but should be a clean and humane place for persons incarcerated for a crime to be detained from society." said Sheriff Johnson. HE SAID THE three-member three-member evaluation team will usually include a police chief or sheriff, a jailer, a member of the Council of Criminal Justice, Jus-tice, a public official, a citien-at citien-at -large, etc. "We want persons interested in-terested and with some knowledge know-ledge of jails to participate on the evaluation team." the sheriff said. Representing Davis County on the first evaluation eva-luation team will be Wolfgang (Jossett. former administrator of the Davis County Jail. MR. SMITH said he be lieves the new standards program prog-ram w ill do a lot to upgrade the jails throughout the state and provide jails w ith a measure of comparison. "Previously, each jail was operated solely by the sheriff and he seldom had to account to anyone unless there was some sort of investigation. It was not uncommon for jail personnel per-sonnel to be sued for alleged mistreatment of prisoners or because of substandard facilities. facili-ties. "WITH THIS new program, we w ill have some sort of comparison com-parison of one jail with another and more important, whether or not the jail meets the minimum mini-mum standards as outlined in this program." said Mr. Smith. He explained that there will be follow-up programs to the initial evaluation, but emphasized empha-sized that the follow-up programs prog-rams will be to further aid the sheriff and jail personnel rather than be an investigation of what has or has not been accomplished since the first evaluation. SHERIFF JOHNSON noted that the evaluations are a means of "identifying the problems and helping to solve them." The standards program and evaluations have been approved by the Council of Governments (CtXil of each county and have the support of the Utah Division of Corrections. Correc-tions. Utah Association of Counties, and the Utah Sheriffs' Sher-iffs' Association. ABOUT ONE-HALF of the program is funded by a 170.IMK) grant from the National Institute Insti-tute of Corrections, said Mr. Smith. |