Fact Check: Sheriff Penzone says closure of Tent City saves $4.5M – is he right?

Logan Newman | The Republic | azcentral.com

THE MEDIA: Speech.

WHO SAID IT: Paul Penzone.

TITLE: Maricopa County sheriff.

PARTY: Democratic.

THE COMMENT: "By shutting down Tent City, we will be able to save approximately $4.5 million dollars in our budget that can be used in other ways to benefit our operations and to enhance safety on behalf of the detention officers who work in difficult environments and put their safety on the line every day."

THE FORUM: Speech on April 4 to announce the closing of Tent City.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING AT: Will the Sheriff's Office save $4.5 million by shuttering Tent City?

ANALYSIS: Over the past 10 years, Tent City has cost an average of $8.7 million per year to operate. This money covers a variety of day-to-day inmate expenses, including food, clothing and drug assistance programs, said Maricopa County Sheriff's Office spokesman Mark Casey.

But closing Tent City doesn't mean those costs disappear.

“That doesn’t change because they’re moved inside,” Casey said. “That cost is the cost that goes with these inmates when they move.”

There are maintenance costs associated with Tent City, including the tents and grounds, areas with air-conditioning, water and sewage services. However, utility costs are higher in hard-wall jails than the tents, said Executive Chief of Custody Tracy Haggard.

MORE: Tent City, home of inmates in pink underwear, piece of Arpaio legacy, is closing

The department found it would be more efficient to completely eliminate these costs at Tent City and move inmates to jails that already have these expenses. Casey said the county's jails are only about three-quarters full, and in April, about 800 inmates remained in Tent City. It had space to hold up to 2,100.

By consolidating the inmates, the department believes it will spend money more effectively.

The Sheriff's Office doesn't know how daily jail costs will change by moving the inmates, though.

In the April speech, Penzone said that $4.5 million is the best projection of savings “that we could look at as we evaluated all factors not knowing other expenses that could be incurred.”

So where do the savings coming from?

Casey said the $4.5 million is the “sum of (the) salary and benefits” of about 60 detention officers they plan to reassign from Tent City to other jails, where there are 200 staff openings.

Tent City had a higher detention officer-to-inmate ratio because the complex needed the same number of detention officers to patrol the camp no matter how many inmates were there. Though it has held as many as 1,700 people, it averaged 700 to 800 over the past decade.

“That’s the issue,” said Will Humble, the former director of the Arizona Department of Health Services, who participated in the sheriff's Tent City advisory board.

“You have a fixed number of staff that you need for the facility itself, and when the census goes down, you can’t cut that staff proportionately.”

Like the costs of the complex, staffing comes down to efficiency. By moving detention officers from an area with low-security inmates to a place of greater need, the staff can be used more effectively, Humble said.

Additionally, overtime pay for detention officers has cost the county more than $6.5 million from July 2016 through May 21. Moving the guards could abate some of that, but officials did not provide estimates of savings.

Still, the $4.5 million in costs for deputies will be spent. The Sheriff's Office is not laying off staff or eliminating positions with the closure of Tent City.

BOTTOM LINE: Penzone’s projection of a $4.5 million savings by shutting down Tent City only refers the salaries of detention officers who will be reallocated to other jails.

There may be savings from less spending on overtime and some maintenance and utility costs at Tent City, but it's not clear what those will be. The Sheriff's Office did not provide estimates for possible savings.

Humble said the advisory board thought closing Tent City would be the most efficient and economical decision.

“It was just clear to us that in the long run, it would be more efficient to close the facility just because there was no prospect of filling it up to the point where it would be efficient,” he said.

The $4.5 million in detention officer salaries won't be spent at Tent City, but will be reallocated to other jail needs. It's a reallocation of funds, not a savings and Sheriff's Office officials could not provide any estimates of money that the department will not spend due to Tent City's closure.

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SOURCES: Emails and phone interviews with MSCO Director of Policy Mark Casey; video of Sheriff Paul Penzone press conference on azcentral.com; interview with Executive Chief of Custody Tracy Haggard; phone interview with Will Humble; Bureau of Justice Statistics report for inmate-to-guard ratio.

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