Transporting suspects to other jails will tie up Columbia Falls police

When Columbia Falls joins a countywide 911 system in February, the city will lose the dispatchers who watch over the city's modest jail on weekends and after hours.

And with no one watching, the jail will close.

That's not what Mayor Jolie Fish expected when she gave her support to the consolidated 911 center.

"I'm totally against closing the jail," Fish said. "It would not serve our community well to take away the jail."

She is looking for ways to keep the jail open.

Columbia Falls City Judge Susan Gordon is accustomed to swift arrest and incarceration of individuals suspected of committing crimes locally.

"I feel safe in my home," Gordon said. "I can call a police officer and they'll be here in seconds."

But that will change when Columbia Falls police begin transporting prisoners to the county jail — a two- to five-hour process.

Also, in the past 200 days, the county detention center has refused to take Columbia Falls prisoners 32 percent of the time, according to a report by Columbia Falls Police Chief David Perry.

The jail is useful in other ways. It convinces people to pay their overdue traffic fines.

"When they are placed in jail," Perry's report notes, "they seem to come up with the money."

Without the jail, fines and forfeitures could drop as much as 10 percent a year over the next five years.

Perry expects the jail closure will require the city to hire two officers to cover for those who transport prisoners out of town.

Perry said folks might just have to get used to the city doing business differently.

"I can assure you we will not compromise the public's safety," Perry said. "Our biggest hurdle may be changing how the city employees, police officers and citizens view the new procedures and services that we can provide."