Atlanta city officials need to give the Atlanta Detention Center to Fulton County to ease overcrowding in the county’s violence-prone jail, a bipartisan panel of state lawmakers said in its final report, released Friday.

“A big part of the solution is that the City of Atlanta needs to turn over the Atlanta Detention Center to Fulton County in its entirety,” Sen. John Albers, a member of the Fulton County Jail Subcommittee, told State Affairs. “Fulton County taxpayers paid for that. It was a jail. Then Atlanta decided they wanted to get out of the jail business, and basically, all those inmates ended up in the Fulton County Jail. They are part of the cause of the overcrowding. So they [Atlanta officials] need to now do the right thing.”

Albers is chair of the Senate Committee on Public Safety, which created the Fulton jail subcommittee.

The 35-year-old Rice Street jail complex in downtown Atlanta has drawn national attention, local outcry and a federal probe due to overcrowding, drugs and violence. Built to house 1,125 inmates, its capacity has often exceeded 3,000. 

The subcommittee was created in October to investigate conditions at the crisis-prone Fulton jail complex where over 10 inmates have died in the past year.

The six-member panel has met seven times. It has looked at the jail system’s population, how judicial and administrative procedures affect the jail and staff shortages in judicial circuits. The subcommittee heard from experts, jail officials and others about funding and solutions that would improve efficiencies with the jail system’s network.

The final report contains 17 recommendations intended to help improve working relationships among the various county networks tied to the jail complex. It also offers solutions for fixing the overcrowded facility through renovations, including having the county commission oversee all tax money to build a new jail or renovate existing facilities.

The report also recommends: 

•  The Fulton County sheriff and commissioners meet weekly to “improve the relationship, trust and spirit of teamwork to solve problems.”
• Fulton work with the Georgia Sheriffs’ Association to use a third-party jail expert to oversee any building, renovation or consolidation of the overcrowded jail complex.
• Fulton commissioners create a jail advisory board of representatives from the commission, sheriff and district attorney’s offices as well as Fulton’s Clerk of Courts and Superior Court.

During the subcommittee’s 10-month investigation, the number of inmates at the Fulton jail complex has dropped by 1,000, Albers said.

“We delivered [the report] to all those involved in Fulton County,” Albers said. That includes the Fulton County Commission, the sheriffs’ and district attorney’s offices, and the county’s judicial system. 

The report will be given to the Senate Committee on Public Safety when the legislative session resumes in January, Albers said, at which time it will formally be accepted before being presented to the full legislature.

“The goal now is for Fulton County, from the judiciary to the district attorney to the county commission and the sheriff, to execute these items and get themselves on a good, long-term track,” Albers said.

Related stories:

State lawmakers target Fulton County Jail for investigation

Senate panel hears struggles, challenges of Fulton County Jail

Have questions, comments or tips? Contact Tammy Joyner on X @lvjoyner or at [email protected].