Robert Gude, jail administrator, said Tuesday that since the approval, the contract needs the signature of the DOC director.
Gude said the jail could get prisoners as soon as May 5.
The jail's host facility, from which the jail will get its inmates, is the Jim E. Hamilton Correctional Facility in Hodgen near Poteau.
The jail is allowed to have 16 DOC inmates at one time, and the jail will receive $31 a day per inmate, amounting to $181,040 a year, not including commissary and phone use.
Gude said he hopes all the spots will be filled. He noted it is cheaper for the Hodgen facility to keep the inmates themselves, but overcrowding has been a problem there.
The county jail's maximum capacity is 116 inmates. He said since the DOC inmates will be long-term, they will do most trusty work inside the building. The inmates are minimum to medium security prisoners. Gude said the jail will not house maximum security prisoners.
Gude said since the jail will now house DOC inmates jail personnel will be required to have extra training. He said jail employees will have to take additional training at the Hodgen facility.
In order to house DOC prisoners, the county jail had to have additions, including an exercise area, educational program, and a drug rehabilitation program.
"Some standards we already had in place," Gude said. He said the jail had to add new policies and buy some equipment.
The exercise area will be in the sallyport, an enclosed area on the jail's west side. The inmates are allowed in the exercise area one hour per day.
The educational program for prisoners was the last hurdle the county jail had to cross in order to house the inmates. Gude said Cherokee Nation and Workforce Oklahoma are working in conjunction to provide the educational or General Education Development (GED) program. Gude said Mike Wright with Sequoyah County Drug Court will be providing the drug re-habilitation program.
Gude said the jail currently has seven prisoners that are of DOC. He said those prisoners are waiting to be sent to be sent to Lexington to be processed through the DOC system. With those prisoners, the jail makes $24 a day. As of Tuesday, the jail was also holding 13 prisoners for LeFlore County, which also generates $31 a day per prisoner, because the LeFlore County Jail was full.
"Those numbers will fluctuate," Gude said.
Gude said the county jail has been at capacity one time, but at that point, the jail had several DOC prisoners waiting to be transferred to Lexington.
Gude said the jail has had numerous inspections in order to prepare for the DOC prisoners.
"Every 'i' had to be dotted, every 't' had to be crossed," Gude said. "The jail authority helped out a lot to get this off the ground."
Gude said the jail won't be getting DOC prisoners until May 5 because the Hodgen facility is currently getting audited and they don't want to make any transfers.
"I think it's going to generate a lot of revenue," Gude said.
Gude said the additional training will also further the knowledge of jailers.
Other positive aspects will be that Gude will be able to put more prisoners with cash fines working on road crews, which will get them out of jail faster. He said the DOC trustees can take spots inside the facility. Those who work on road crews get paid more than those inside the facility.
