Sheriff Backs Rental of Jail Near San Diego : Overcrowding: Support comes as surprise. Debate on idea picks up, with some saying county can’t raise the needed funds.

Sheriff Brad Gates, offering a surprise endorsement to the idea of housing Orange County prisoners in an empty San Diego County jail, recommended Thursday that Orange County set aside $43 million to move ahead with the plan.

“I want all 1,500 beds,” Gates declared in an interview as arguments for and against the jail plan began to take shape.

But Orange County officials said they don’t believe the money is available, and critics of the jail idea began to emerge as the proposal became public.

Gates, despite his support, expressed frustration with some county supervisors and staff members for not informing him earlier of the idea to rent the 1,500-bed East Mesa jail on the Mexican border from San Diego County.

“It’s been bouncing around the Hall (of Administration) for days, but no one bothered to talk to the sheriff,” Gates complained. “It’s disappointing when no one bothers to talk to the man in charge of the jail. You wonder what the words cooperation and teamwork mean.”

Supervisor Don R. Roth, who first raised the idea in talking with San Diego County Supervisor Leon L. Williams last week, said he never meant to keep Gates in the dark.

“This was a very casual discussion between San Diego and myself, and I never realized that anything more would come out of it than a letter from one county administrator to another. It was never the intention to cut the sheriff out of this,” Roth said. “And I’m sorry Brad Gates is getting miffed.”

After Roth’s inquiry, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday directed its staff to begin talks with Orange County about the idea of renting out the East Mesa Jail to Orange County. San Diego County officials say they are ready to move ahead if Orange County can afford it.

The medium- to maximum-security facility was completed last October at a cost of $79.6 million, but San Diego hasn’t been able to open it because of a cash crisis.

Some officials aren’t sure Orange County will have any better luck.

San Diego officials estimate that housing a prisoner in their facility costs $78.10 a day. Based on the cost of filling all 1,500 beds for a year, Gates asked Orange County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider in a meeting Thursday to look at setting aside $43 million “immediately.”

But Schneider said in an interview: “I don’t know where we’re going to get this $43 million. If that’s coming out of the (the sheriff’s) budget in jail operations, fine, but otherwise there’s no new revenues available for that amount.”

Even beyond the financial hurdles, several officials active in the jail issue voiced concerns about solving Orange County’s mounting jail overcrowding problem by busing prisoners 95 miles to the south.

“I can’t believe that anyone would consider this anything more than a Band-Aid solution,” said Assemblyman Tom Umberg (D-Garden Grove), who has worked in Sacramento on legislative remedies for Orange County’s jail problems.

“I think it’s great that Don Roth is continuing to keep the issue in focus because this is an issue that’s not going away,” Umberg said. “But what happens when (San Diego) boots us out of there? We’ll be in worse shape.”

Attorney Dick Herman, who has helped secure several court orders on behalf of Orange County inmates who have sued over living conditions, said, “It’s just not a good idea--period.”

To isolate inmates from families, employers, lawyers and potential witnesses “would just be so burdensome that it would create intolerable conditions,” he predicted.

Herman said he and other inmate advocates would consider legal action if the county moved ahead with the plan, but for now, he is not worried.

“It’s just so unlikely that this will ever happen,” he said. “Maybe next they’ll put them on a prison boat and dock them in Catalina. These are all such ridiculous ideas.”

But Orange County Municipal Judge Richard W. Stanford Jr., who held Gates in contempt last year for releasing prisoners early because of jail overcrowding, said the San Diego idea appears worth exploring. “I’m glad to see somebody’s interested enough to look into it,” he said.

As for concerns about distancing inmates from families and legal counsel, Stanford said that should not be “a controlling factor” in the discussion. “Isn’t that true any time you send them off to state prison?” he asked.

San Diego county officials indicated in interviews this week that they would want to maintain the flexibility to move their own prisoners into the jail when their own cash crunch eases.

But this issue may prove a point of contention in negotiations. Gates said he wants Orange County officials to try to “lock” into a guaranteed, five-year lease for the facility.

The San Diego idea would allow the sheriff to stop “putting criminals on the street” and would give Orange County breathing room to find a permanent site for a new jail, after last year’s collapse of a proposal for a Gypsum Canyon facility in the Anaheim area, Gates said.

“This is a great idea by Supervisor Roth, and I’ve directed my staff to do everything possible to help make it work,” Gates said in a prepared statement.

Gates’ endorsement came as a surprise to many county officials, since the sheriff has long held that the only long-term answer to the jail crunch is to build a new jail.

“I’m astounded,” one official active in the jail issue said of Gates’ response. “I think he’s trying to call (the supervisors’) bluff.”