NEW ORLEANS — It may be the equivalent of a Hail Mary, but Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hutson is making one last-ditch effort to get a federal judge to re-consider his order to build a costly wing of the city jail to house mentally ill inmates.
In a letter to U.S. District Judge Lance Africk last week, Hutson urged the judge to explore alternatives to the new wing – known as Phase III – calling its design “outdated” as well as “inhumane and dangerous.”
“The proposed Phase III has numerous flaws that undercut its effectiveness as a means of complying with specific provisions of the consent decree,” Hutson wrote in the letter dated June 21.
Among the many design issues raised by Hutson and her legal team is a plan for the jail cells to be arranged in a circle with “glass fronts, so the patients are on view 24/7.”
“Such a lack of privacy among severely mentally ill patients undoubtedly will cause further psychological damage,” Hutson wrote.
Another major concern voiced by the sheriff is the escalating price tag for the new wing. Originally estimated to cost about $40 million when it was designed more than six years ago, the cost is now pegged at about $115 million.
“This cost equates to $2+ million per actual cell,” Hutson wrote.
While FEMA funds left over from Hurricane Katrina would cover about $38 million of the cost, the city and sheriff’s office would be on the hook for the remainder. After two rounds of public bids, a lone bidder submitted an estimated construction cost of $88 million, the sheriff’s office estimated, bringing the total to $115 million when “soft costs and fees” are added.
Those increased costs, in addition to the budget strain of staffing a separate medical lockup, has sounded alarms throughout city government, including a rare united front by the mayor’s office and City Council.
“The numbers we're looking at, you could build a five-star hotel that would be cheaper than Phase Three,’ Council President J.P. Morrell quipped.
The council weighed in last week with a resolution, passed unanimously, asking for the court's help in “auditing and analyzing” the steep cost increase. Council Vice-President Helena Moreno authored the resolution.
“The fact that we are now three times the initial projection of the cost of this project is really concerning and alarming,” Moreno said. “We need to make sure that we're not being fleeced, that these are appropriate dollars being spent.”
While the court may lend an ear to concerns about the increasing cost of the project, a reversal of Africk’s original order to go ahead with Phase III appears to be dead in the water.
In response to Hutson’s letter, U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael North, writing for the court, ordered a hearing Wednesday to address the sheriff’s concerns.
“This document makes clear that a status conference is necessary to ensure that the parties in this case understand the case history, this Court’s prior rulings, the consequences of ignoring those rulings, and the Court’s determination to see through its previous orders,” North wrote.
While Hutson won her upset campaign over incumbent Sheriff Marlin Gusman partially on her opposition to Phase III, the court has re-iterated the order since she took office in May 2022 and inherited the consent decree negotiated by Gusman and then-Mayor Mitch Landrieu.
Morrell, an attorney, concedes that the all viable appeals to Africk’s order appear to be exhausted. But he said a cash-strapped city coming up with the money for the new wing is a separate and equally severe challenge.
“There are a tremendous amount of projects the city is working on we'd probably not have to move forward on,” Morrell said. “We don’t think it’s right to penalize the residents of the city to have roads not fixed, to have affordable housing not built, to have police or fire stations put on hold to build this overly expensive property.”
“We’re just saying can we please have a conversation and revisit what we’re building and how much it costs,” Morrell said.