Yellowstone County's jail is well beyond its limits, and commissioners are drawing a line.
The facility was designed to hold 434 inmates but is currently housing around 650 — a population that includes federal detainees, inmates from neighboring counties, and roughly 100 people waiting for a bed to open in a state prison.
Watch jail story here:
Now, for what a commissioner says is the first time during his tenure, Yellowstone County has declined to sign a detention agreement with another county.
Sheriff Mike Linder, R-Yellowstone County, approached commissioners at a discussion meeting last Thursday, about an agreement with Golden Valley County to house its inmates.
Golden Valley's three-cell facility that hasn't been regularly used since the late 1970s or early 1980s and is unable to accommodate a violent offender.
Justice of the Peace Brandon Carpenter said the county typically transports inmates to Wheatland County or Musselshell County.
But Linder said neither would accept the individual because of his violent history.
"Musselshell County wouldn't take him because he's violent. Wheatland County wouldn't take him because he's violent," Linder said.
Linder did accept that prisoner, saying it was for public safety.
"That was within his purview to accept a prisoner who was dangerous, that was a danger to the community. He certainly had the ability to hold that individual without a detention agreement," said Commissioner Mark Morse, R-Yellowstone County.
While Yellowstone County maintains existing agreements to house inmates from Carbon, Stillwater, and Big Horn counties, commissioners declined to enter into a new agreement with Golden Valley County.
A commissioner explained the reasoning, pointing to the timing of a planned ballot measure asking taxpayers for $195 million to address the jail's overcrowding.
"For me to in the same week, explain to people, the taxpayers that I'm going to ask them in November for $195 million that we're over capacity, and then in that same week, I'm going to sign a detention agreement with Golden Valley saying I'd take their prisoners, and that's not the right thing to do," Morse said.
The financial picture adds another layer of complexity. Counties pay $130 per day to house an inmate at the Yellowstone County jail. Federal law enforcement pays $115 per inmate per day. The state pays just $86 per inmate per day — well below the $126 per day it actually costs to house the 80 to 100 state inmates currently held there.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
