Repeated attempt: Ballot measure asks Whatcom voters for tax to build a new jail
Whatcom County voters are considering a measure on the Nov. 7 ballot that seeks a 20-cent sales tax on every $100 purchase to fund a new jail in Ferndale for 400 to 440 inmates at an estimated cost of $137 million.
It will be in addition to the one-tenth of 1% tax approved in 2004, which is still being collected and was used to build the minimum-security jail work center and fund annual jail operations. The current jail near the courthouse in downtown Bellingham is 40 years old and requires millions of dollars in safety renovations.
It’s the third time in eight years that the county has sought such a tax after similar measures failed in 2015 and 2017.
It will require a simple majority of votes to pass.
Current jail capacity is 362, including 150 at the work center.
This new proposal comes after months of discussions and planning among elected officials and volunteers with experience in law enforcement, social services and former jail inmates. A key element of the plan allows for the tax to be used to expand mental health services, substance-abuse treatment, jail diversion programs and supportive housing for inmates as they are released.
All voting is by mail in Washington state. Ballots must be postmarked — not simply placed in the mail — by 8 p.m. Nov. 7 to be counted.
Ballots can also be placed in official ballot drop boxes that will be locked when polling closes.
Arguments for the tax
Rejecting the tax measure would prolong today’s untenable situation, with inhumane jail conditions and insufficient treatment options, said Stephen Gockley, co-chairman of the Incarceration Prevention and Reduction Task Force and a member of the jail’s Stakeholder Advisory Committee.
“The people in 2015 and 2017 didn’t want a large new jail without diversion and treatment programs. (But) you can’t just acknowledge the treatment needs without acknowledging the criminal-legal needs,” Gockley told The Bellingham Herald.
But this time around, a series of meetings with a diverse group of “stakeholders” from mental-health professionals to people who have spent time in jail developed a plan that combined requests for a larger jail with calls for increased mental heal and substance abuse treatment, along with supportive housing after inmates are released.
“It’s really a consensus product. To have the broader concept is really important to the community,” Gockley said.
“I know that trust is a real conundrum around this issue. (But) all our legislators in Olympia are behind this and ready to work to bring extra tax dollars,” he said.
“I regret that it’s being simplified in the minds of some people without even having answers to what we do in the next few years. It’s a big complicated effort to change lives and protect the community at the same time,” Gockley said.
In prepared remarks to the County Council on July 11, when the council voted to place the measure on the ballot, County Executive Satpal Sidhu said that the current jail proposal has little in common with the previous two plans, and he asked voters to support it.
“The proposed ordinance strikes a balance. It is a great compromise. The proposal before you tonight addresses the community’s broad spectrum of priorities,” Sidhu said.
In addition to the Whatcom County Council, the measure is supported by the mayors and elected city councils of all seven cities. It’s also favored by every state legislator in the 40th and 42nd Districts who live in Whatcom County.
The Whatcom Republicans is endorsing the tax.
Supporters have raised $36,877, mostly from individual contributions, according to filings with the state Public Disclosure Commission.
Arguments against the tax
Opponents of the tax say that elected officials have intentionally allowed the current jail to fall into its current inhumane conditions because of a lack of maintenance.
It should be remodeled to hold only serious felons awaiting trial and funding should be focused on building affordable housing, expanding mental health and substance abuse treatment programs, and offering job-training services.
It’s the wrong funding method in a bad location with no guarantees of services, opponent Josh Cerretti said during a Bellingham City Club forum on the issue.
“The reality is that the proposal funds jail construction first and could potentially strangle our ability to actually fund services in the future,” Cerretti said.
In a jointly written ballot statement against the measure, Makenzie Graham, Andrew Reding, and Todd Lagestee referred to a 2017 report to the County Council that said the jail population was too high because people were being held awaiting trial.
“Today, it’s even worse. People who can’t afford bail lose jobs and housing, leaving them homeless. This proposal postpones services until 2030 to build an unaffordable mega-jail,” they said.
“In other words, for the first four to six years, zero funds will go to behavioral health, treatment, or homelessness support — services that our communities desperately need now,” Graham wrote in a letter to The Bellingham Herald.
“Voters are essentially being asked to write a blank check to Whatcom County, without any concrete guarantee that our money will be spent as promised. Even more alarming, we’re being asked to blindly funnel more money into a project where the final costs are not yet known, even to the architects of the plan,” she said.
In an interview, Graham told The Herald that voters have twice rejected a jail tax and should do so again.
“A new jail is not going to solve homelessness. It’s not going to solve addiction. It’s not going to solve poverty. It’s not going to solve the fentanyl crisis. Jail is not housing and jail will not solve homelessness,” Graham said.
“Some public figures support this jail tax in part to avoid being labeled as ‘soft on crime,’ but that’s missing the point and oversimplifying this complex issue. Opposing a new, unaffordable, bigger jail is not about being soft on crime — it’s about giving care to the people who need it,” she said.
Further, Graham said the jail measure does nothing to address racial disparities among the jail population.
“Whatcom County adopted a resolution in 2020 affirming that racism is a public health crisis, committing to ‘actively participate in the dismantling of systemic racism through deliberate funding and policy decisions.’ Passing Proposition 4 would do the exact opposite,” Graham said in her letter.
Jason McGill, head of Northwest Youth Services, told The Herald that providing housing and mental health and substance-abuse services is more humane than jailing people.
“We’re basically setting them up to remain within the (jail) system. They don’t have housing. They can’t get a job because they have a record. Why not focus on solutions?” McGill said.
Jail opponents have raised $75,500, according to filings with the state Public Disclosure Commission. That includes a $75,000 pledge from the Inatai Foundation of Seattle, a nonprofit that works for racial justice and social change.
The Whatcom Democrats made no formal endorsement but are recommending a vote against the tax.
This story was originally published November 2, 2023 at 9:51 AM.
