Innovative Jail Financing

In these difficult economic times, County or City officials are no longer able to utilize traditional funding methods for their long-needed infrastructural projects. In regions like Michigan, Florida, or Georgia, where deteriorating real estate or manufacturing conditions have eliminated Bond Issues or Sales Tax referendums, local officials are wondering how critical projects like County jails can get done. “There is no doubt,” says Haralson County Commissioner Allen Poole, “we just couldn’t try to get a tax passed again. Our last attempt failed several years ago-and it’s much worse today than it was back then.”

Fortunately for Commissioner Poole and a few public officials like him, solutions can arise through creative efforts. “We needed someone to show us a different approach to financing our jail project,” says Sheriff Bryan Atkins of Andrew County, Missouri, “we’ve needed a new jail for over 20 years and now it’s a ticking time bomb. But it had to be done without a tax increase.”

This creative approach comes in the person of Lawrence Goldberg, AIA, Senior Partner of Goldberg, Sullivan, McCrerey Architects and Planners, whose nationwide Criminal Justice practice has included successful and innovative financial planning as well as architecture for over 20 years: “Its rarely magical financing, it’s just finding some way to identify and balance the County’s financial resources with realistic project costs.”

Years ago, Goldberg developed a number of project benchmarks corresponding to what Public Bankers needed to see in order to finance public projects. These benchmarks include overall project costs, staffing and operational costs, sources of revenues, and finally, how it all comes together to establish healthy Debt Service Coverages. These benchmarks were expressed in four Charts (Charts A though D) which Goldberg and his staff have successfully used and refined over the past 20 years. Today, Public Bankers throughout the nation recognize Goldberg and his Charts for what they are: unique planning tools where financial analysis and architectural design come together on a level of performance rarely seen in public architecture. “We don’t know of any other architect who does the financial planning Goldberg does. It makes our job easier and the County knows exactly how to operate their project successfully,” explains John Harris, Senior Vice-President of Country Club Bank, who helped finance Goldberg’s recent Vernon County, MO Law Enforcement Center.

Successful cost control is essential. “If you are proposing that a jurisdiction re- capture prisoner housing costs to help make its annual payment, you have to hit your project budgets, “ says Goldberg. Construction budgets and Staffing levels have to be realistically determined and agreed upon between the Sheriff, Jail Administrator and County Commissioners. If Operating cost projections include ten jailers and 60 days later, the Sheriff tells the County Board they really need fifteen jailers, the County will probably face severe financial repercussions.

Nonetheless, the process can involve risks. The Sheriff’s Department and County Board are making a long-term commitment together and politically, things can go awry. “Some years ago, we designed a fairly large Revenue-based Jail project, predicated upon housing Federal Prisoners at $40-45/diem and a staffing level of 34-36 jailers. What we didn’t see coming was the County Commissioners’ political vendetta against the Sheriff,” explains Goldberg. When the smoke cleared, the Sheriff had resigned, the Federal Prisoners had disappeared and the new Sheriff had hired 58 or 59 jailers. “Needless to say,” say Goldberg, “this carefully-planned, four-year project turned into a fiasco and took the County several years to recover.”

To avoid these potential pitfalls, Goldberg helps jurisdictions establish Project Advisory Boards, which meet periodically to review their new facility’s performance. Goldberg’s staff also assists the County with virtually every aspect of its move into the new facility; from Staff training to developing Procedures and Policies Manuals and Post Orders. Goldberg’s staff visits the Facility periodically for months after the opening project opens, to check on Building performance and Operations. “After all these years worst nightmare,” says Goldberg, “is to design a good project and watch it fall apart after occupancy. We just don’t let that happen.”

Alternatives to County Jail Financing

The Achilles Heel of virtually every proposed new county jail project in this country is its financing.  Each jail project, no matter how relatively simple or how complex, costs millions of dollars; often high double-digit millions.  County tax increases, often in double digits as well, are the age-old method of financing such projects no matter what they are or where they are located.  They always provoke a public outcry, cause ill feelings and delay projects.

Larry Goldberg, AIA, ASC, ACA, doesn’t simply design new jails or renovate existing ones, he helps clients in 22 states finance them, as well, through a network of community bank-based and independent tax-free municipal bond underwriters.  Few, if any, architects in the country care how this is done to assist their clients, let alone know how to do it.  Larry Goldberg, on the other hand, has been helping counties avoid onerous tax increases for thirty years.

He is prepared to explain in a concise feature story exclusive to you when such tax-free financing is feasible for any county jail or similar criminal justice system project anywhere in the country; how it is accomplished; and to cite as examples recent jail and related projects whose counties have benefited from employing “the Goldberg method.”

As public relations counsel to Goldberg, Sullivan, McCrerey Architects & Planners, Inc., will you kindly let us know if you are interested in either interviewing Mr. Goldberg via phone or internet, or having him draft a proposed article for your approval and editing?  Larry Goldberg is prepared to amply illustrate such an article, with simple reproducible charts, and with installation photographs of actual recent projects that employed this financing method.

"...we didn’t want to come back in 5 years or 10 years and have to redo a job so we went with the best. I’m very happy with the way it’s designed and the way it’s met our needs.

Pat Collins - Commissioner - Cherokee County, KS