NEW BRAUNFELS, Texas – In about a week, Comal County will begin moving inmates into the county’s new $72 million jail.
The new facility is replacing the old jail built in 1985 to accommodate the county’s growing prisoner population.
While touring the new jail Wednesday, Sheriff Mark Reynolds said the design was the result of extensive research.
“We had the opportunity to look at four or five county jails in Texas and take the best of those designs and incorporate them into this one,” Reynolds said.
The jail features a pod design rather than a linear design.
“Our pods are designed where everything, almost always everything, that an inmate would need or officers would have cause for, is located within that pod,” Reynolds said. “So that inmates aren’t having to be moved all over the jail. The officer’s control station allows an officer to see the entire day rooms.”
The jail also includes a 60-bed infirmary for treating both male and female inmates and isolation rooms, should COVID-19 become an issue in the facility.
Reynolds said the jail also has a fiscally attractive aspect. It can expand from 600 to 1,000 beds. Those beds are also available for other jurisdiction usages, like overflow for other county jails.
“What it enables us to do by renting those beds or allowing county prisoners to come in is to recoup those tax dollars,” Reynolds said.