Officials Hope To Begin Tuscaloosa County Jail Demolition In October

TUSCALOOSA, AL — The Tuscaloosa County Commission on Wednesday authorized spending $20,000 to lease a storage site in Northport for certain items at the Tuscaloosa County Jail as work moves forward on the demolition of the current facility to make way for a new, state-of-the-art corrections center.

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As Patch previously reported, plans call for the addition of a 34,000-square-foot medical/psychiatric and minimum-security dormitory for the jail, along with new inmate worker housing units.

Earlier this month, the Commission accepted a pair of bids for the site work and general contractor on the project.

On Wednesday, though, Chief Deputy Loyd Baker, who serves as commander of the jail and who has spearheaded the large-scale construction project, said the space leased on Main Avenue in Northport is owned by Stone Properties and would be used to store sleeping bunks and tables that will be used once the new jail is completed.

Baker said after shopping around, he found that the temporary storage site could potentially save the county hundreds of thousands of dollars by providing a place to store the steel sleeping bunks and tables instead of discarding them and eventually having to purchase new ones.

Baker went on to say that the hope is for demolition work on the current metro jail to begin at the end of October, weather permitting.

And for the temporary jail site, which will house inmates nearby until the work is completed, Baker said the construction phase will hopefully be completed by Oct. 1, which will allow officials to begin playing to move inmates.

The temporary modular jail site, located on a lot near the current jail, consists of several trailers or mobile homes that will be used for jail pods.

"I hope we will be in the demolition phase by the end of next month because winter is creeping in and we don't want to get into the wet season for demolition," he said. "Once we get them into the temp facility, it's easier to supervise in that facility than it is in the current metro jail."

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