In a New Jailhouse Now

Sullivan County Sheriff’s Office opens its doors to the public to showcase new jail expansion

Kerry Doyal told his kids he hoped Saturday was the only time they would see the inside of a jail.

The Kingsporter and his wife, Robin, took their four boys and two family friends to an open house at the Sullivan County Sheriff’s Office, where a newly completed jail expansion was unveiled.

“It sounded like a neat thing to do as a family,” Doyal said. “It’s educational.”

Visitors toured the jail and new administration wing and browsed displays where officers explained the various operations of the Sheriff’s Office.

Ten-year-old Karter Doyal and friend Erik Cochran, 13, of Gate City said they enjoyed the department’s armory and seeing contraband items confiscated from inmates.

“All those guns and stuff – that was pretty cool,” Erik said.

“This is just a smart thing to have and to bring your family to,” Kerry Doyal said, adding that he hoped the event would encourage a positive attitude toward police officers.

Sheriff Wayne Anderson said he planned to host tours of the newly completed jail only but then decided to make a day of it by showing visitors other parts of the operation.

“I thought, Let’s go a step further and show off what we have,” he said.

Police-dog handlers and explosives officers and members of the Mounted Patrol and SWAT and dive teams talked to visitors about their jobs. The Fatal Incident Support and Reconstruction Team truck, a mobile crime scene unit and an arson van also were on hand.

Those who attended also could walk through the administration building’s records and dispatch centers and the women’s wing of the jail.

Plans for the four-phase renovation began in 1994, and ground was broken for the new jail addition in March 2000.

The sheriff said Saturday marked the end of phase two, which cost $6.6 million. Administrators were moved into new offices as part of the first phase so construction could begin in the second, he said.

The jail houses inmates arrested in the county and Bristol, which does not have a jail, and Kingsport, which has only an overnight facility. More than 5,100 inmates were booked there last year.

The jail used to be a 317-bed facility and has been expanded to sleep 502 inmates. Anderson said it’s a major improvement, but the addition still wasn’t meeting demand. The jail had 524 prisoners this weekend. Because of the crowded conditions, some of them have to sleep on mattresses on the floor, the sheriff said.

Phase four — installing a prefabricated 300-bed pod – will be completed next, Anderson said. The addition would allow the department to discard a 17-year-old, 150-bed annex built as a temporary holding facility.

“It’s not built like a jail’s supposed to be built,” Anderson said. “Right now, we keep that annex up as best we can, but it’s throwing money down the drain.”

Sending state inmates to other jurisdictions has helped control the jail’s population, the sheriff said, but he expects to have an average of 600-650 prisoners next year.

“When I came in, there were 585 prisoners in that jail that held 317,” he said. “I said, ‘This isn’t going to work.”

He began sending inmates to jails that entered a contract in 1989 to prisoners from other localities.

“Since 1998, we’ve moved 795 inmates out of the jail,” Anderson said.

The sheriff said he expects in a few months to ask the County Commission for the $3 million needed for the pod.

Phase three is to include a $5 million expansion of jail administration offices, the kitchen and medical facilities.

“It’s my recommendation that they go straight to the pod and work their way in,” the sheriff said.

“We need administration offices, we need a bigger kitchen, but we need those beds now.”