BEMIDJI — Four members of the Beltrami County Board and county department heads toured the under-construction facility that will replace the current downtown jail.
The new $80 million building near Bemidji's Industrial Park is slated to open in May 2027.
Jail Administrator Calandra Allen, who led the Tuesday, Oct. 7, tour, will oversee both facilities during the transition. The old jail will then be torn down and replaced with a parking lot.
The new jail will be opened in stages. It has four blocks divided into single and double cells. At full capacity, it will be 243-beds.
Allen donned her own pink hard hat as she highlighted the new design and technology to monitor certain vital signs of incarcerated people.
“We've had individuals actually detox for about five days,” Allen said. “Our goal is to catch them before they slip into a seizure or before they slip in anywhere."
The tour demonstrated the new facility's secure meeting rooms, gathering and recreational spaces and negative pressure areas, which contain air around medical and detox units.
Attendees also visited the future smudge room for the Native American cleansing practice of burning sage, which is in another negative pressure area. This helps to keep smoke inside the room, so it doesn’t trigger sprinkler systems.
Allen said the term "jail" is outdated.
“We are not just a jail. We are a corrections center,” she said. “We have a ton of program space, and we want to rehabilitate them so they have a reentry back into our community."
Beltrami County taxpayers overwhelmingly voted for a new sales tax in 2023 to fund up to $160 million for the construction, plus demolition and renovation at the old site, as well as bond interest.
County Administrator Tom Barry said the goal was to maximize staff efficiency, with clear sight lines throughout the building and technology improvements.
“We know what the staffing requirements are that the DOC [Minnesota Department of Corrections] puts us under,” he said. “It was really critical to us to design a facility that didn't massively expand the need for FTEs [full-time equivalent staff]."
A public open house at the new jail is expected in the spring.
“We'll open the whole facility up and we'll let the community come in and sort of mosey about the facility and see where their tax dollars are going,” Barry said.
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