Houston Public Media: Hundreds more Harris County inmates will be moved to Louisiana after closure of west Texas private jail
September 25, 2024
Hundreds of Harris County prisoners will be sent to another privately operated out-of-state facility after the upcoming closure of a northwest Texas jail, which previously housed pretrial inmates from the…
Topics: 2024news, Custody Death, outsourcing
Harris County
Hundreds of Harris County prisoners will be sent to another privately operated out-of-state facility after the upcoming closure of a northwest Texas jail, which previously housed pretrial inmates from the Houston area.
The Giles W. Dalby Correctional Facility — located in Garza County, nearly 500 miles from Harris County — previously housed about 500 people from Harris County as they waited for their day in court. Now, the facility is expected to shutter its doors by the end of the month, so the Harris County prisoners will be brought back to the Houston area and then moved to the Natchitoches Parish Detention Center in Louisiana by Nov. 1.
County officials have leaned on outsourcing contracts to alleviate chronic overcrowding and understaffing within the Harris County Jail — a temporary solution that’s costing the county more than $50 million. The Natchitoches facility, located more than 200 miles away in Louisiana, will be the third privately operated out-of-state facility holding pretrial prisoners from Harris County, joining the Tallahatchie County Correctional Facility in Mississippi and the LaSalle Correctional Center in Louisiana.
Jail reform advocates like Krish Gundu, executive director of Texas Jail Project, have been pushing against the county’s overreliance on outsourcing. On Friday, Gundu expressed frustration about the county’s decision to work with yet another private facility outside of Texas.
“We were hoping that the county would see this as an opportunity to meaningfully address the issue of overincarceration, instead of choosing to ship more pretrial detainees out of state,” Gundu said. “If the county chooses to expand its contract with LaSalle, what they’re essentially telling us is that they prefer a lack of regulatory oversight.”