Developer Vows to Continue Plan for Private Jail : Project: Kathryn Thompson wants to build facility in county but may not be able to run it unless laws are changed.

Despite a legal opinion that private companies could not operate county jails, a local developer vowed Friday to push ahead with preliminary plans to build a private jail in Orange County.

“I don’t think this will affect us at all,” said Lawrence G. Grossman, a former county consultant who now is executive vice president of developer Kathryn Thompson’s company, Detention Services of California.

Last month, Thompson, convinced that the private sector can turn a profit in the jail business, suggested to officials that she could build a jail faster and less expensively than the county government. She said the jail, which she proposed for female inmates in Garden Grove, was needed quickly to help relieve jail overcrowding.

That proposal and others stem from the county’s urgent need to find new jail space and ease severely overcrowded conditions that have led to court-ordered releases of some prisoners, contempt orders against Sheriff Brad Gates and general confusion on how best to tackle the problem.

Grossman said Friday that Thompson’s company could still design and build a jail facility but not operate it. However, he said he expected the law to be changed in the future to allow private companies to operate county jails. He said privatization has already occurred in some city jails and state prisons.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Roger R. Stanton said Friday that Thompson could still build a jail and not operate it, or maybe become involved in other projects.

“There’s other things that if she’s interested could be done--like operating detoxification centers or related-type activities or building a jail and not operating it,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned it’s still an open discussion.”

In an opinion to County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider dated April 7, County Counsel Terry C. Andrus said private companies or individuals could not operate county jails, a job restricted to the Sheriff’s Department or other law enforcement agencies.

Andrus said state statutes specifically gave the sheriff, not the Board of Supervisors, authority to operate jails. He said state laws would have to be changed to allow persons other than peace officers to run the jails.

“As a practical matter, it would also be necessary to amend other state statutes that limit the authority of non-peace officers to perform many of the functions essential to running a jail, (such as) carrying weapons while transporting prisoners or in a courthouse and determining probable cause to strip-search pre-arraignment detainees without a warrant,” Andrus wrote.

He also noted that handing the operations of the jail over to private individuals could significantly impact the risk of county liability for violation of prisoners’ civil rights and could expose county supervisors to contempt orders growing out of jail overcrowding.

In a letter to the Board of Supervisors last month, Thompson expressed interest in building a women’s jail for the county’s use, saying she believed that a private company could operate a jail for 10% to 40% less than the government.

She has put together Detention Services of California to build and operate jails and prisons at the local, state and federal level. Grossman, who was the leading jail consultant for the county, joined the private firm this week.

The company is based in Aliso Viejo but plans to move its staff of 20 to Sacramento.

Thompson said in an earlier interview that she has made a substantial investment in the company, which is bidding on a 48-bed jail project in Santa Ana. She said the company is also talking to other cities about jail projects.

In his opinion, Andrus legally cleared the way for Orange County to send prisoners to an empty jail in San Diego County that officials there could not afford to operate.

But that plan had already been rejected by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors.

The idea of renting the brand-new jail in San Diego was first floated in March, but critics charged that it was too expensive and that Orange County could not afford it.

Sheriff Gates, who was unavailable for comment Friday, supported the plan but said it could cost as much as $43 million a year.

San Diego County officials said the facility could cost about $78 per bed per day--the figure they quoted last year to federal officials in failed talks over renting the jail. But Orange County officials said the actual cost may be closer to $50 or $60 per bed and that the county may be interested in only renting 200 or 300 beds, not 1,500 as suggested by Gates.

The San Diego jail cost $79.6 million to build.