Jacksonville FL — As he begins his second term, Jacksonville's Sheriff Mike Williams says one of the things he's focused on moving forward is starting conversations on possibly moving the jail or adding a mental health facility for inmates.
“And the conversation is simply, you know, do you want to build a 4,000 bed jail or do you want to build a 2,500 bed jail and maybe a 1,500 bed mental health facility.” Sheriff Williams says.
He says mental health issues have an impact on what JSO does everyday. Sheriff Williams says about more than 30% of inmates in jail have some sort of mental health issue.
“That’s a conversation we’ve got to really really focus on in these next several years in Jacksonville, is how do we address our mental health issue.” Sheriff Williams says.
He says there has to be a better strategy to dealing with mental health issues moving forward and he’s committed to starting the conversation for that and he hopes it will continue.
Currently Sheriff Williams says there is no timeline for when any of these ideas could be implemented.
