New jail location: Monroe County OKs Phase 2 enviro study, hears opposition from Ellettsville

This past Wednesday, Monroe County commissioners approved a second environmental study for North Park on West Hunter Valley Road, just north of the Bloomington city boundary.

North Park is the location that commissioners are currently considering as a possible location for a new jail.

The Phase 2 study comes after two public meetings held at the Ellettsville fire station—last Sunday (June 2) and Wednesday June 5)—which were hosted by county commissioners.

The fire station meetings confirmed some strong opposition from residents near the proposed jail location. Highlights from the meetings included opposition from Ellettsville leaders, who are concerned that locating a county jail at North Park will have a negative impact on the future economic development of the town.

The meetings also revealed that county elected officials might not have been on the same page on a key question: Who will decide the size of the new jail?

A new jail is now planned, because in 2008, the ACLU filed a lawsuit stemming from conditions at the jail, and the facility is now operating under a settlement agreement, reached in 2009, which has been extended several times. The work of two consultants was delivered to the county three years ago, which included a conclusion that the current facility is “failing.”

For B Square background on the question of a need for a new county jail, see: Monroe County sheriff, commissioners square off at committee meeting, ACLU lawyer says: “Look, you need a new jail. Everyone knows that.”

Phase 2 Environmental study

The Phase 2 environmental study for North Park will be done by VET Environmental under a contract worth $28,417.

VET has already done a Phase 1 study, which was approved by commissioners in mid-March.  While Phase 1 studies are based on historical use, documentation and a site inspection, a Phase 2 environmental study involves actual sampling and laboratory analysis.

The Phase 1 analysis confirmed an expected potential issue related to historical PCB (polychlorinated biphenyls) contamination. County commissioners confronted the same issue recently when Monroe County purchased property just to the south of the North Park area, for use as a future limestone heritage destination site.

In technical terms, what the Phase 1 study confirmed were a REC (recognized environmental condition) and a VEC (vapor encroachment condition), stemming from the Bennett Stone Quarry Superfund Site.

According to VET, “Based on the available documentation, residual contamination exists to the east of the [North Park property] at the Bennett Site and in Stout Creek, which adjoins the eastern Subject Property boundary.”

VET’s report continues: “Potential soil, water, and vapor impacts to the Subject Property from the eastern adjacent Bennett Site cannot be ruled out, and constitutes an REC and a VEC.”

Who decides how big the jail should be?

At the June 2 Ellettsville fire station meeting, county commissioner Julie Thomas put the decision making responsibility for the size of the new jail facility on Monroe County sheriff Ruben Marté and the seven-member county council, which is the county’s fiscal body.

Thomas put it like this: “We [the county commissioners] are not going to determine the number of beds in the facility, the size of the facility. That’s something that the sheriff’s department and the sheriff will have to work out with the council.”

That essentially repeated a sentiment Thomas had expressed a few days earlier, at the May 29 county commissioners meeting, when she was previewing the June 2 event: “And it’s really going to be up to the county council and the sheriff’s department to meet and to figure out and determine the size of the jail facility that they plan to use, that they want to build.”

But some observers have had the understanding that the commissioners, as opposed to the county council, would decide the size of the jail, based on their statutory responsibility for all of the county’s physical assets. That sentiment was reflected in remarks from Monroe County circuit court judge Mary Ellen Diekhoff a year and a half ago, at a Jan. 9, 2023 meeting of the community justice response committee (CJRC), which was attended by county commissioners.

Diekhoff said, “I want to just say that I think everyone on this committee fully understands it’s the commissioners who pick the location and decide the number of beds, that it’s the council who decides the funding. And it’s the judges who decide the people who go there.”

At the June 2, Ellettsville fire station meeting, from her seat in the audience, county councilor Kate Wiltz reacted to the statement from Thomas, that the county council, not the commissioners, would work with the sheriff to determine the number of beds in the new facility. Wiltz said: “I hadn’t heard that actually. Being on council, I’m like: Really?! So when did we talk about that?”

Thomas replied to Wiltz, saying, “The council and the sheriff need to sit down and determine the size of the facility that you want to build.”

For its part, the county council weighed in with a policy document several months ago that includes a 400-bed limit on the new jail facility. A more recent recommendation, from a statutorily required feasibility study done by county commissioners indicated 450-500 beds was the best number.

That recommendation, made by RQAW Corporation, has been criticized, because the number came from just taking the average figure for the number of jail beds per capita in the six counties adjacent to Monroe County.

Reaction at Ellettsville fire station meetings

Opposition from residents who live in the general vicinity of the proposed jail location at the two Ellettsville fire station meetings was attested by several attendees.

Some nearby residents said they want not just visual screening in the form of hedges and the like, but actual physical barriers to prevent just-released prisoners from wandering towards their property.

Some attendees had specific concerns that when prisoners are released, they’ll find a natural place to hang out, in a future park, south of the potential jail location, for which the county purchased land two years ago.

At both public meetings, Ellettsville leaders, some who have been working on a future plan for the town called “Envision Ellettsville” expressed concerns about a potential negative impact on the town’s future development

At the June 5 meeting, Christa Curtis, president of the Greater Ellettsville Chamber of Commerce told commissioners: “Collaboration across this county is very difficult. It’s very challenging.” She continued, “Decisions like this impact a lot of different parts of the county.”

Curtis described the interstate highway exit signs near the proposed jail location: “One of the things I cannot get out of my head is when you come off I-69, the exit is at Ellettsville. It doesn’t say Bloomington, it says Ellettsville.”

About the residents of Ellettsville, Curtis said, “They have thoughts and feelings about what they want this community to be. So I think it’s really important that you listen to that, because this can set a tone.” She said she’s uncertain of what the tone would be if bail bond businesses crop up in the surrounding area, so that when people come off the interstate they pass right by Ellettsville and head to Spencer or to Bloomington.

Curtis wrapped up by saying, “I’m struggling with what this does for us as a community and how this fits into our plan and our vision.”

Also weighing in at the June 5 meeting from an economic development angle was former Ellettsville fire chief Mike Cornman. He talked about the key concept of “quality of life” and how the area west of I-69 has its own demographic. The market will determine what gets developed on the land proposed as a jail location, Cornman said.

Attending the June 5 was landowner Steve Crider, who talked about the challenge he had faced in trying to market the property to big box stores. At one point the land was slated for the location of IU Health’s new hospital, but the health care provider opted for the location on the east edge of Bloomington off SR-46.

Crider has talked to retailers like Meijer and Kroger, he said, but they are not interested. He had even looked at the possibility of developing the land as apartments, Crider said. None of those attempts have panned out.

The property is currently zoned as a planned unit development (PUD), but a jail facility is not one of the allowed uses for the PUD.

That means if the county commissioners decided to go ahead with the North Park land as a jail location, it would still have to go in front of the Monroe County plan commission for a recommendation. Even if the plan commission recommended denial of the rezone, county commissioners could approve it.

The denial of a rezone request has already factored into the efforts of county commissioners to find a jail location. In December of 2022, Bloomington’s city council denied the county’s rezone request for land in the southwestern  tip of Bloomington.