McHenry County Jail and icebergs

In what way is the McHenry County Jail like an iceberg?

With icebergs you can see 10%, and 90% is out-of-sight. I'm not sure you can even see 10% of the Jail. What brings this to mind?

Today's headline on Page 1 of the Northwest Herald reads, "Jail population stays flat." The article doesn't support that headline.

There's your 10%, folks.

I'll bet if you start talking to the jailers (err, Corrections Officers, as they like to be called now), they'll tell you a different story.

They'll tell you that the numbers (the "population") in the McHenry County Jail are dropping. Look at the numbers with the article. And that staffing is remaining at former levels.

In any well-run business, when your work starts to shrink, you begin to cut back.

You reduce or eliminate overtime.
You revise work schedules to staff for busiest times.
You let attrition (resignations, firings, retirements) reduce the number of employees.
You don't hire as many new employees.
You don't keep promoting people to higher pay grades.

Well, that's what a well-run business would do.

Where is Clara Peller when you need her? She made "Where's the beef?" famous. Here's the "beef".

The truth isn't in averages. The truth is in trend. And the trend at the McHenry County Jail is down, down, down.

You probably don't want to blame the reporter for this sub-headline, "Inmate numbers hover well below max capacity." What does that mean, anyway? "Hover"?

Jailers will tell you that the numbers haven't remained "flat" in recent years. They are dropping, as the Feds move their prisoners and detainees elsewhere. I wonder where the Northwest Herald reporter got his facts, or if he got any facts. I recommend he look at the actual reports of the Jail for a three-year period on a month-to-month basis. And then compare the "population" with the number of employees and payroll for staff. Publish that.

Why are the first four months of 2013 being compared with 2011 and not with 2012? Or with both years? And, if a daily average of contracted detainees for the first four months of 2013 is 262 (down 25% from 2011) , what are the actual numbers for January, February, March and April? How high was the High? How low was the Low? What's the trend?

Where did the reporter get "To prevent overcrowding at the jail, officials lean heavily on services provided through the McHenry County Circuit Court system, including the Mental Health and Drug courts"?

Jail personnel don't have a thing to do with that. These courts provide an opportunity for a defendant to straighten out his life and they provide strong support to do so. Unlike in the Jail, where inmates are just warehoused until they have served their sentences. When the jail is emptying out, the Court isn't worried about over-crowding.

The Jail's contract with the Feds runs out in 2015. Will the Feds just say "Hasta la vista"? And then we'll be sitting with a lot more empty beds and cells at 2200 N. Seminary Ave. And how big a mortgage payment?