Late ’22 new goal for opening of jail

ASHDOWN — Construction on the new $8 million Little River County jail is scheduled to be complete late in 2022.

“The weather has held it up. We were kind of in a holding pattern for a while. But we are pretty happy with where we are, considering everything,” said Little River County Judge Mike Cranford, the county’s chief executive.

The timeline had to be adjusted from opening this spring because of factors such as wet weather and supply chain issues, Cranford said.

“There have been a lot of things out of our control. But we are running pretty smooth now and making up time we lost,” Cranford said. “We had a tremendously wet spring but once we got that pad done, we hit the ground running.”

Little River County voters approved a bond issue in September 2019 to finance the new building and a sales tax to help pay for it.

The new tax went into effect Jan. 1, 2020.

County officials looked at four different properties for the new jail site and each site had its advantages, Cranford said.

The new jail will be located on U.S. 71 on the north side of Ashdown, near Cossatot Community College of the University of Arkansas, which is based in De Queen but has a campus in Ashdown.

The Southbuild Team, which includes Spirit Architecture Group and SmithDoyle Contractors, are building the detention center.

The Tennessee-based team has worked on a number of correctional centers in several states, including Arkansas.

The current jail, located next to the Little River County Courthouse, holds a maximum of 24 inmates. As a result, the sheriff’s office often houses inmates in other county jails, which leads to higher costs in housing and transportation as well as lower felony bonds.

The new lockup is expected to house 60 to 80 inmates, officials say.