The Anderson County Commission rejects a proposal for a non-binding referendum in August on whether federal prisoners should be housed at the expanded county jail.
CLINTON—Anderson County commissioners rejected a proposal on Tuesday to ask voters in August whether federal prisoners should be housed at the expanded county jail.
The vote was 10-4 against the proposal for the non-binding referendum.
Earlier this month, the Anderson County Legislative Committee had recommended that the full commission consider the referendum, which was proposed by Anderson County Commissioner Dusty Irwin. He represents District 3, which includes the Andersonville, Fairview, Norris, and Glen Alpine precincts, and Irwin’s constituents live in the district that includes the Anderson County Detention Facility in Clinton.
Some county commissioners say that housing pre-trial federal inmates could help cover jail costs, while other county officials, including the mayor, say that they don’t want to get into the federal prison business.
The jail referendum would have required a two-thirds vote by the county commission and a private act by the Tennessee General Assembly in Nashville.
Voting for it were Irwin and commissioners Zach Bates, Steve Emert, and Steve Mead.
Voting against it were Anderson County Commission Chair Chuck Fritts, Vice Chair Robin Biloski, and commissioners Mark Alderson, Jerry Creasey, Whitey Hitchcock, Tim Isbel, Robert McKamey, John Shuey, Tracy Wandell, and Jerry White.
Commissioners Myron Iwanski and Rick Meredith were absent.
More information will be added as it becomes available.
Angi Agle says
Did anybody else get a recorded phone call about this this morning? The “paid for by” was some group I’m not familiar with, and didn’t give a Treasurer’s name.
Dan Black says
Yep, and the phone number attached to the caller ID ((865) 748-6906) belongs to Lynn Byrge and his new “bipartisan” [snicker] political group. See http://oakridgetoday.com/tag/lynn-byrge/
Charlie Jernigan says
I received two of them, one on each of my lines. I stopped listening when they based their arguments on a lack of understanding of the circumstances. I think that was the second sentence…
johnhuotari says
I don’t think we received the call, but a few other people have commented that they did. I’ll see what I can find out on that.
Eileen Slater says
Has anyone noticed that these posts do not address the issue of Anderson County expanding its corrections program to include federal prisoners? Is your only concern who did the lobbying on behalf of the referendum? The organization sponsoring the call named itself in the call and had recently announced itself to the news media. Cloak and dagger, snickering … not very elucidating on the issue.
Angi Agle says
I’m not a big fan of governing by referendum. If it’s such a good deal, why wouldn’t County Commission — who have much more information than the public — just vote to do it?
Rob Woodward says
“who have much more information than the public”
You must not have spoken with your County Commissioners. Both of mine could not answer simple questions about the issue when I asked them.
Charlie Jernigan says
This article was not about the low risk Federal inmates. It was about a misguided attempt to waste money doing what we elect our County Commissioners to do.
The most interesting event associated with this decision to ignore this distraction was the phone calls made by the group who once described themselves as our local “fact” checkers who can’t get their own facts right.
My guess is they really have a different agenda…