City, county officials launch working group to recommend new jail site inside of a month

In a month, it’s expected that a joint working group will make a recommendation on the location for a new Monroe County jail.

The working group was formed on Thursday (June 11), when the Monroe County council and the Bloomington city council met at the historic Monroe County courthouse for a joint session. The working group will include several other local government officials, to recommend a location for a new county jail.

Thursday’s joint session was also attended by mayor Kerry Thomson and county commissioner Jody Madeira. The county and the city’s legislative bodies voted separately to participate in the working group. Thomson said she or someone she designates will participate. 

Subject to their willingness to join the group, it will include representation from the board of county commissioners, the sheriff, the board of judges, the prosecutor, and the public defender.

The city council appointed council member Sydney Zulich as its designee for the working group during yesterday’s meeting, while council member Liz Feitl will fill the role for the county council.

The proposal to build a new county jail has been the focus of much back and forth between the county council and the board of commissioners in recent months. It has become an even more pressing project for the county after a 17-year-old settlement agreement with the ACLU over unconstitutional conditions at the jail was not renewed this year. The dismissal of the lawsuit means that the county will likely face new litigation over current conditions. [Monroe County jail timeline]

Before the settlement expired on May 29, the question of a new jail site at the North Park location was brought to the county council twice within the last eight months. The North Park site was rejected on both occasions. 

County council president Jennifer Crossley explained at the beginning of Thursday’s meeting that the council’s rejection of the North Park site was based on the desire to approve a better proposal. “I know we kept saying, we’re not saying no to things, but we're saying yes, and saying yes is having this conversation,” she said.

Thomson and county council member Kate Wiltz co-facilitated the meeting. Thomson outlined her own thinking as the joint session started: “I won’t speak for my council colleagues, but they have taken official action to express their desire to support innovative solutions around the jail and I am here, likewise, to make sure that we do everything we possibly can to make sure that when this new jail gets built—and that is a foregone conclusion, we need a new jail—that that we carry that project out in the best way possible,” she said.

The attendees then set parameters for what they wanted to discuss through the joint working group. 

They settled on determining a deadline by which they could build a jail, a shortlist of locations and then a final candidate site.

City councilmember Courtney Daily focused on engaging the stakeholders for this project. “We need community buy-in, we also need buy-in and support from the sheriff's office as well. We need to take their viewpoints all into consideration,” she said.

City councilmember Andy Ruff called for a full accounting of what the project would cost. “I think the community needs to see some what I would call full cost accounting of what the full costs are, not just construction costs, but impacts on incarcerated folks, their families, all the coming environmental impacts of all the comings and goings, not just environmental impacts of materials and construction,” he said.

The consensus at Thursday’s meeting was the first step to any discussion for this new project was to decide a location. County commissioner Madeira laid out the six factors that would decide the suitability of a site for this project. 

“We need site control or county ownership, legal permissibility, and zoning or permitting paths. Construction feasibility—so no known utility, road, environmental, geotechnical design, major delays. We need operational adequacy—in other words, sheriff and design professionals confirm that it can support their needs, classification, circulation, intake. We need a fiscal path. Can we fund it and vote on a timeline? And is it defensible to a court? In other words, can the council present it as a reasonable, timely remedy in federal litigation?” Madeira said.

The county council  heard from the city’s side about its approval processes that are related  to construction of a jail. “The process and how long it takes depends entirely on what kind of zoning changes need to be made, and some things can get done at the administrative level, other things have to go to plan commission and even council, I have and will recommit to the administrative side being as expedited as we possibly can,” said Mayor Thomson in response.

She added later that if the county’s file was “absolutely complete when it was submitted,” the fastest expedited process would take four months to get the project through the city council.

For the working group, the assignment was to meet as often as needed for meetings in public, which will be advertised by both the city council and the county council. 

The joint session of the city and county council, the mayor, and the board of commissioners will then reconvene a month from now, to hear the working subgroup’s recommendation on a new jail site.

Photos: Joint meeting on the jail (June 11, 2026)