Salt Lake County Jail bond on track to fail, votes not final

Nov 11, 2024, 3:00 PM | Updated: Nov 18, 2024, 12:17 pm

The Oxbow Jail in South Salt Lake is pictured on Friday, Feb. 19, 2021. (Spenser Heaps, Deseret News)

(Spenser Heaps, Deseret News)

Reporter

SALT LAKE CITY– The Salt Lake County Jail bond is on pace to fail. The bond seeks to combine two jails and add beds for inmates.

The $507 million jail bond seeks to close down the old Salt Lake County Oxbow Jail and add beds to the Salt Lake County Metro Jail. Furthermore, the county wants to build a justice and accountability center. According to county officials, it would house and support low-level offenders.

At the time of publication, votes supporting the bond totaled more than 208,000. However, votes opposing the bond totaled over 222,000.

Salt Lake County Clerk Lannie Chapman said votes are still being counted. Election results will not be certified for another eight days.

“With all [that] being said, I don’t think this is something that they will be able to recover from,” Chapman said regarding the 14,000 vote deficit.

Salt Lake County Councilwoman Aimee Winder Newton said she was, “disappointed,” with the preliminary voting results.

“Our population’s increased by 300,000 people in the last 21 years … we haven’t added a jail bed in that time period,” Winder Newton said.

“I want to do what’s most fiscally prudent, and that is definitely not to pour money into the old Oxbow Jail, which is what we’ll have to do if we don’t do something different.”

According to a spokesperson for the Salt Lake County Mayor’s Office, officials plan to reconvene “soon” regardless of the final voting outcome.

Voting results will be certified on Nov. 19.

Adam Small is a reporter for KSL NewsRadio. He primarily reports on the Great Salt Lake and Natural Resources. Follow him on Facebook and X.