Cost of Holding Center Suicide Patrol

I read a recent article on suicide attempts at the Erie County Holding Center and although this may sound callous, I need to speak out.

First, what do you expect?  Outside of the wrongly-accused bystander, these people are at the holding center for a reason.  They have committed a crime, probably because of poor judgement, mental issues or anger.  They are not your run of mill average Joe.

The holding center is overcrowded by almost 75%, there are huge budget issues prevented the successful operations of the center and even on the best of days, its a crummy job.  I understand that the inmate suicide scares have dictated a removal of more than just ties and belts.  Sheets have been eliminated.  One recent guy hung himself with his underwear.

One comment was to have one to one ratio of guard to inmate.  Can you imagine the cost?  We have no money for schools, no money for health care, no money for the homeless yet we can spend money on criminal suicide watch?  No way.

It these people are so miserable, let them do what they need to do.  It would be a better use of our funds to improve our mental health services (another program experiencing budget cuts) and would probably result in protecting future victims.  If money were not an issue, then fine try to save, try to rehabilitate, try to understand.  But it is an issue whether we like it or not and I would prefer to see us trying to make people's lives better so they do not need to perform actions that get them into the holding center.

My heart goes out to the families of all inmates, suicidal or not.  But I believe they wouldn't be in that position if they had the public services necessary to  save there loved ones before they resorted to crime.