CUYAHOGA COUNTY, Ohio — Kareem Henton is with the Jail Coalition. He wants the Cuyahoga County Jail to stay in downtown Cleveland since the courthouse is in the same building, giving defense attorneys easier access to their clients.

What You Need To Know

  • Cuyahoga County Executive Chris Ronayne has proposed a new $750 million county jail in Garfield Heights

  • This would move the current jail out of Cleveland

  • Ronayne will propose the new site to the County Council at their next meeting

"Having a setting like this allows for the attorneys to see them a lot more," Henton said. "Separating the two. Separating the jail from where the courthouse is located is gonna actually make that worse because now they're gonna have to make a separate trip to go see their clients. And that's going to lead to them actually not being able to see clients perhaps as much as they should and need to."

The current jail has been plagued by excessive force complaints, safety concerns and lawsuits.

County Executive Chris Ronayne is about to propose a new $750 million jail in Garfield Heights. Ronayne said it would be more cost-effective to build a new jail instead of renovating the current jail. A Google Maps search shows the new site is 15 minutes away from the current site. Henton said there are more resources available for a poor or homeless defendant if they’re processed in Cleveland. 

“A lot of the people that find themselves in the criminal justice system are homeless people," Henton said. "Are definitely poor people. So they’re gonna have transportation issues. They’re not gonna know where to go. But if they’re in downtown Cleveland, they would have access to 2100 Lakeside, which is a shelter here. They would have access to the City Mission, which is a shelter here.”

Henton said that time will add up depending on how many people need to go to court and back.

“You know how much extra time that is?" Henton said. "Going there, coming back. So you’re talking at least 15-20 minutes just going there and 20 coming back. Then they have to process the people in.”

Ronanyne said he picked this site out of 47 different locations. He said the new site has more room compared to a building in downtown Cleveland.

“You know, the practices as we’ve reviewed them nationwide and throughout Ohio are trending more toward uncoupling the jail and the courthouse itself," Ronayne said. "More than half of the new facilities built in modern era here in Ohio are not connected."

Ronayne said he wanted a site that is in the middle of the county and that the extra space also allows the county to provide extra services for defendants.

“We would like to build a campus with other justice-related services like a diversion center on the campus itself," Ronayne said. "So this gives us the opportunity and scale to spread out in a campus like environment, our central services.”

But Henton said the jail should be in Cleveland since it’s the county seat and the most populated area in the county.

“The area that is the most populated but also the area that is the equipped to handle the populations that find themselves entangled in the criminal justice system," Henton said. "That’s not gonna be Garfield.”

Ronayne will propose the new site to Cuyahoga County Council at their next meeting. The council then must approve it in order for the project to move forward. Ronayne said if it is approved, it will likely take years before the new facility is up and running.