The Ada County Jail is the biggest and most secure facility of its kind in Idaho – and it’s getting very crowded.
Our jail has 1,116 beds. For the last year, our average daily population has been 1,013. That’s too many.
The population is more manageable today at 952. If you want to see how those 952 inmates are housed, on what kinds of charges they are being held on, and age and gender information, check out our new online dashboard.
Most of it is pretty self-explanatory, but there are a few terms to define. In the “holds” section, you will see four fields – JOC, PV, Transit, and USM.
JOC means judgement of conviction, which means those inmates have been sentenced to the custody of the Idaho Department of Correction and are waiting for a bed to open up at an IDOC facility.
PV is parole violation, which means those are IDOC inmates who have violated the terms of their parole and are being held until they can have a court hearing. Many of those people also have new criminal charges. For instance, we have 167 PV holds today (March 31), and 53 of those inmates do not have any other charge associated with them.
USM are U.S. Marshal holds, where we house inmates locally who are in the custody of federal law enforcement.
The “operational” and “rated” capacity designations are about safety.
For any jail, the average daily population goal is 85% of capacity or less. That is the standard for operational capacity, which allows for inmate movement and maximum safety.
If jail staff need to isolate inmates or move them around for safety issues, the less space they have, the harder it is to do.
So any time the Ada County Jail population crests 949, it is over operational capacity. The rated capacity of the jail is 1,116.
The same concept applies to the jail dorms. So for example, dorm 2 has 92 beds. The operational capacity of that dorm is 78 beds. The rated capacity is 92.
The “total inmates in boats” refers to inmates who have to sleep on cots on the floor of a dorm where all the available beds are full.
So if you see a dorm over 100% rated capacity, that means cots on the floor.
Keep an eye on the website, as we will be adding information about the ACSO’s Pretrial, Alternative Sentencing, and Misdemeanor Probation programs in the future.