Sheriff Austin Garrett
Hamilton County Sheriff Austin Garrett said the $26 million expansion of the Hamilton County Jail and Detention Center is the beginning of a 25-year plan to overhaul the jail facilities and population.
The renovation of the jail off Standifer Gap Road will be complete in December, he said.
Sheriff Garrett reflected on his first year in office and the year to come at the Pachyderm Club meeting Monday.
“I got way too many low-level offenders in my jail,” and too many mental health patients, too, he said.
Sheriff Garrett said the jail’s current population of 1,100 people is too high for Hamilton County’s size. He said his office and the district attorney’s office “work every day trying to get those numbers down.”
Inmates may serve as long as a year before the Tennessee Department of Corrections transfers them to a state facility.
He said the Sheriff’s Office is tasked by the state to transport people with mental illness, but “it’s not humane in my opinion,” he said.
Ambulances can do the job better because people with mental illness often need medical attention, he said.
His 25-year plan will involve separate housing for mental health patients and more maximum security space.
Sheriff Garrett said the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program in the county schools will lead Hamilton County through the fentanyl epidemic, along with arresting the people who are “pushing the poison.”
“We’re kicking doors off the hinges,” he said.
He resurrected DARE locally last year after two decades of dormancy. Program curriculum shows students in kindergarten through 12th grade how to recognize and resist peer pressure that sucks them into drugs and violent crime. Two DARE officers in the county schools this past school year will be joined by a third officer this year.
Sheriff Garrett said there is “no policy” at the southern U.S. border to keep fentanyl out of the country, and that local law enforcement is the best way to curb fentanyl deaths.
“That poison is pouring across,” he said. He said 140 people in Hamilton County died last year of fentanyl poisoning.
Sheriff Garrett said Hamilton County is set to be the first county in the state to put school resource officers in every public school and charter school, referencing a Friday announcement by the Sheriff’s Office. The final class of deputies will start their training at the end of August.
He praised Hamilton County’s municipalities for chipping in to cover officers for the charter schools within their borders. Most recently, Soddy Daisy announced funding for its two charter schools.
He said the state will provide $2 million, or $75,000 per school.
“That’s a big commitment,” he said, but it’s not enough to fund the $130,000 to $140,000 total startup cost per officer, including equipment, he said.
“They shouldn’t have to worry about making ends meet,” Sheriff Garrett said.
Sheriff Garrett said the Sheriff’s Office and the County Commission have an effective partnership to fill what were 100 vacant positions “across the agency” when he was elected one year ago. He said he froze compensation in upper positions and raised compensation to recruit people to fill IT, deputy, jail and school resource positions.
“That plan has proved successful, overwhelmingly,” he said. He said he trimmed the corrections department from 60 to 25 people.
Sheriff Garrett said incremental county funding will fill out the rest of his staffing plan, and he said he has “no doubt” that the County Commission will come through.
The Sheriff said he grew up watching his father serve as a volunteer deputy sheriff in Bryant, Ala.
“I believe this is the most noble profession that you can choose,” he said. He has served locally for 30 years, starting in the Chattanooga Police Department.
“Always add value” is his guiding principle, he said.
