Bristol County Sheriff’s Office installing air conditioning to housing units, here is how they will pay for it

The Bristol County Sheriff’s Office has a plan to install air conditioning in all of the remaining housing units at the BCSO Dartmouth campus that don’t have AC except Ash St campus in New Bedford as that is expected to be closed in the near future.

According to Sheriff Paul Heroux, this has been an active project since the summer of 2023 and is finally becoming a reality.

“Excessively hot housing units in correctional facilities is a local and nationwide issue. Air Conditioning in housing units is necessary for several reasons. Courts have held that excessive heat can be a violation of inmates’ 8^th Amendment rights. Part of the test is whether the temperature presents a substantial risk of serious harm to an inmate’s health. Inmates with health conditions and older inmates don’t fare as well in extreme temperatures. Inmate on inmate assaults increase as the temperatures increases. Research and everyday experience show that when temperatures get hotter, tempers also get shorter. This can be dangerous in a correctional facility. Inmate on staff assaults increase as the temperatures increases.”

Heroux states that his goal is to run a modern, humane, professional correctional organization.

“Over half of the inmates in my custody are awaiting trial/have not yet been found guilty. Regardless, if an inmate is sentenced (~40%) or awaiting trial (~60%), extreme heat undermines the rehabilitative purpose of the jail by making it more punitive and dangerous. Even if some members of the public don’t want inmates to have AC, the living spaces of the inmates are the workspaces of the nearly 300 Correctional Officers. They go hand in hand. Hot conditions threaten the health of Correctional Officers by increasing the risk for inmate violence on staff and putting them at risk from heat related conditions.”

According to Heroux, the money for this project is coming from existing sources and will incur no further costs to the taxpayers.

“The BCSO has two sources of funds to pay for these new AC units. The first is that we used a federal grant to purchase $130,000 worth of 28,000-36,000 BTU mini-split air conditioning units for some of the smaller housing units. These AC systems will be installed by BCSO maintenance staff, which includes a staff member who are licensed electricians and HVAC professionals. Maintenance staff have saved and will save the taxpayers a substantial amount of money taking on large projects such as the AC project rather than outsource it. The larger housing units will use inmate canteen funds. We will not use mini-splits for these larger units; we will use rooftop units. The BCSO (and other correctional facilities) have collected a commission from inmate canteen purchases over the years. Canteen allows inmates to use money provided by friends or family to pay for snacks, drinks, limited personal items, etc. When I arrived at the BCSO, that inmate canteen fund had accumulated over $1.5 million. This fund is now up to about $1.6 million. Per 103 CMR 911.08 this money can only be used for the general welfare of the inmates. This includes programs, materials, clothing, and in this case AC for their housing units. The BCSO is also exploring putting solar panels on our campus to offset year-round electrical costs. A good element of this plan to install AC in the housing units is that I don’t need to ask the legislature or taxpayers for additional money to make this happen.”

Installation starts on Monday in the four housing units of the Women’s Center, which houses about 50 sentenced and awaiting trial women.