NEW BOSTON, Texas -- Nearly 20 years after Bowie County officials decided to forgo operating their own correctional center, they now face going back into jail operations.
On Nov. 9, LaSalle Corrections, a private company that's managed the Bowie County Correctional Center for about 10 years, notified county officials that it intends to allow its current contract to expire as of Feb. 12.
LaSalle's decision will leave the center to once again be operated by the Bowie County sheriff's office as of Feb. 13, 2021 -- a circumstance which will require the county to have to hire and train a jailing staff.
While this situation isn't necessarily new to Bowie County, the circumstances are somewhat different.
As far back as July 1989, Bowie County officials were concerned that the relatively new Bi-State Justice Building's 164-bed jail would never be large enough to accommodate increasingly higher numbers of inmates being fed into it, not only from Bowie County but also from Miller County along with Texarkana, Texas, and Texarkana, Ark. All four owned the Bi-State at the time.
Starting between 1993 and 1995, Bowie County conducted a three-phase renovation of the the Twin Cities' 1930s-vintage mail terminal building, not far from the Bi-State. The effort led to the creation of the county's current 748-bed correctional center.
By the mid-1990s, the sheriff's office staff grew from its 40 deputy positions to at least 200 personnel, owing in large measure to about 160 jailers needed for the new correctional center.
The county operated the center principally between 1993 and November of 2001, when an economic downturn that year, coupled with other factors, forced the county to contract out the center's operations to private firms.
Bowie County Sheriff-elect Jeff Neal said efforts are currently underway to have a jail staff in place by February, but he added that the Bowie County Commissioners Court will need to approve the number of jail positions necessary as well as the funds needed to to finance the additional staffing.
Bowie County Judge Bobby Howell said the county may have to hold a special Commissioners Court meeting. Or it might be able to consider taking up the creation of jailer staff positions at regularly scheduled meetings depending the need.
"We will find out what Sheriff-elect Jeff Neal recommends regarding the number of jailers he will need for staffing in place before mid-February," Howell said.