Martin Hall board votes to keep facility

Martin Hall, the juvenile detention facility in Medical Lake to which Whitman County sends its underage offenders, will stay open for at least another year.

Commissioner Pat O’Neill reported Oct. 1 the board of directors of the nine-county consortium that oversees Martin Hall’s operations voted Sept. 27, to keep it open for one more year.

The directors considered closing the facility because the number of youths being housed there has not been enough to cover operating costs. O’Neill, who sits on the Martin Hall board as Whitman County’s representative, told the Gazette last week he anticipated Thursday’s decision by the board.

Martin Hall has been housing about 19 juvenile offenders a day. To recover operating costs, the facility needs about 25.

Whitman, Adams, Asotin, Douglas, Ferry, Lincoln, Pend Oreille, Spokane and Stevens formed the Martin Hall consortium in 1995. Each county issued bonds to renovate a former residence hall at Lakeland Village into the detention facility. Whitman County will pay off those bonds in 2016.

O’Neill said the Coeur d’Alene Indian tribe signed on to house three to six juvenile offenders at Martin Hall at a cost of $185 a day.

“Well, that’ll help the bottom line,” Commissioner Greg Partch commented.

Member counties, including Whitman County, will pay $165 per day to use Martin Hall next year, a decrease from the $175 per day fee charged this year.

That, said O’Neill, would save the county about $60,000. Whitman County’s contract requires the county pay for 2.5 beds per day, whether they are used or not.

The consortium contracts Martin Hall operations with Community, Counseling and Correctional Services, a private company based in Helena, Mont.

The firm is also transporting juveniles to and from the center instead of having county employees drive them back and forth. That will save all the counties about $100,000 a year, said O’Neill.

O’Neill said Nez Perce County rejected an offer to use Martin Hall, opting instead to continue to use its own facility, which O’Neill said is operating at a steep loss.

“I think they’ve put themselves in a very awkward position,” said O’Neill. “We could have saved them a half-million bucks.”