Time to stop increasing liability and accept accountability for our neglect of the existing jail / Letter to Whatcom County Council, Dena Jensen

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kelli and korthuis no spell check 3 mill jail

September 22, 2017  Dena Jensen

Here’s my latest letter to the council regarding the need to renovate the existing jail facility now. It was sent to council@co.whatcom.wa.us, and copied to all the city councils, the County Executive, and the Sheriff. Keep writing and calling!

Dear Whatcom County Council:

I am writing to call on you to move forward as quickly as possible with renovations on our existing Whatcom County Jail facility on Grand Ave., that will address necessary and critical life safety issues.  Continue reading →

Notes and perspective: The 9/12/17 design2 LAST presentation on renovation of the Whatcom County Jail / Noisy Waters Northwest

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September 15, 2017  Dena Jensen

On September 12, 2017, Lauri Strauss, CEO of design2 Last, gave a presentation to the Whatcom County Council’s Finance and Adminstrative Services Committee regarding anticipated renovation to the existing county jail facility located adjacent to the Whatcom  County Courthouse in downtown Bellingham. Continue reading →

‘An unwillingness to spend money’ to keep the Whatcom County Jail facility functioning: Where does the buck stop? / Facebook post, Sj Robson

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elfo and louws sketches

3 hrs  September 1, 2017  Sandy Robson

Back on August 2, 2017, I had written a piece about having heard Whatcom County Sheriff Bill Elfo, who was a guest on KGMI’s “Saturday Morning Live” (SML) July 22, 2017, conservative talk radio program, hosted by local Tea Partier, Kris Halterman. Sheriff Elfo was there to discuss the proposed new Whatcom County Jail which would be funded by a sales tax, a tax that would last for the next 30 years. The jail sales tax proposition will appear on the November general election ballot, to be rejected or approved by Whatcom County voters. Continue reading →

County Sheriff Bill Elfo points finger at County Facilities Management Department for County Jail being in disrepair: My phone conversation with County Facilities Manager, Mike Russell/ Facebook Post, Sj Robson

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saturday morning live elfo on jail

August 1, 2017  Sandy Robson

Whatcom County Sheriff Bill Elfo was a guest on KGMI’s “Saturday Morning Live” (SML) talk radio program, hosted by local Tea Partier, Kris Halterman. Sheriff Elfo was there to discuss the proposed new Whatcom County Jail which would be funded by a sales tax. That sales tax would last for the next thirty years. Continue reading →

Both Councils Ignore Jail Studies / NorthwestCitizen, Juliette Davis

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Jul 15, 2017  Juliette Daniels

On Monday, July 10, The Vera Institute presented its preliminary data findings on the Whatcom County justice system at a special meeting of the Incarceration Prevention and Reduction Task Force (IPRTF). It took months for the Vera Institute to obtain the necessary data on the County Jail population in 2016, but the results confirmed stunning racial disparities in the jailed population, as well as a sizable pre-trial population that could be significantly reduced with the use of evidence-based methods of incarceration prevention. Continue reading →

6/13/2017 Public Hearing “to gather comments on the sizing of a proposed new jail in Whatcom County” / Facebook post, Noisy Waters Northwest

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June 8, 2017  Dena Jensen

At the Public Hearing at next week’s County Council Meeting on Tuesday June 13 at 7 p.m. (rally at 6:00 beforehand), it seems our comments on jail bed numbers (the number of people we envision being incarcerated in our county in the future) need to be based on all the best statistical data we have in our private-citizen hands that supports that we now have all the tools at our disposal, and will continue to have more, that will allow a reduction in the number of people we are incarcerating and that we are ready to begin a new age that abandons our failed justice system. Continue reading →

The “Illusion of Inclusion” series of reports on the Whatcom County Jail / NorthwestCitizen, Juliette Daniels

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illusion of inclusion series

Click this graphic to go to the search results page on NorthwestCitizen where you can access any of these reports.

Keep reading this series of reports on NorthwestCitizen to get an in-depth look at the history of the plan for a horizontal mega-jail. The next installment after those shown in this screenshot of search results for “Illusion of Inclusion” on NorthwestCitizen is also available on their website (it has a slightly different title). Continue reading →

Transparency, or the lack thereof, in Whatcom County Administration / Facebook post, Sj Robson

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personius to sandy hirst resolution 05022017

2 hrs  May 3, 2017  Sandy Robson

Copied and pasted below, and shown in attached screenshot photos, are my recent email communications with County Planning and Development Services Assistant Director Mark Personius, about the Resolution (2017-019) that County Council approved on April 18, 2017, requesting the state legislature to amend the Growth Management Act, relating to the Washington Supreme Court decision on the Hirst et al. case. My initial curiosity regarding the origin of the resolution was borne out of my having listened to part of the audio recording of the April 18, Council Natural Resources Committee meeting, during which Council members seemed to be unaware of who proposed the resolution.  Continue reading →