Assemblymember Gregg Hart’s introduction of AB 2257 represents a misguided, non-collaborative approach to jail management.
There are reasons why sheriffs run the jail systems for 57 of California’s 58 counties. It’s because sheriffs and their staffs have the experience, the knowledge, and the legal authority to run those jails in the most efficient and effective ways possible. (Only one county, Napa, currently operates its jail through a department of corrections. Two counties, Sierra and Alpine, have no jail, but share adjacent county jails managed and operated by sheriffs.)
Madera, Santa Clara, and Napa counties each faced significant legal, political, and operational hurdles in shifting jail control from elected sheriffs to county departments of corrections. Key challenges have included issues with higher costs, efficiency, liability, security, employee morale, and personnel authority. In 2021, Madera supervisors voted unanimously to return oversight and management of the county’s jail to the sheriff’s office. In 2023 similar action was taken in Santa Clara County to return control of the jail to the sheriff’s office. Napa County remains California’s sole county with a separate department of corrections, but historically Napa County civil grand juries have frequently recommended that control of the jail be returned to the sheriff.