Consultants present options for regional jail authority and shared services to Knox County commission

Consultants from SMRT outlined a menu of options for Knox County and neighboring districts on June 4, 2026, including creation of a comprehensive regional jail authority, a narrower authority for secure detention coupled with unified inmate transportation, or long-term contractual partnerships short of forming an authority. The commission accepted the SMRT report by voice vote.

Wayne Applebee, who led the presentation, said the comprehensive option would consolidate diversion, pretrial, detention, reentry and inmate transportation under a single authority serving the district counties to achieve cost and operational efficiencies. "You can phase this in — it could be a three- or five-year plan," Applebee said, recommending counties determine the scope and timing that fit local needs.

A second option Applebee described would limit the authority to secure detention while counties retain local control of community-based programs; he emphasized a unified inmate-transportation unit to avoid duplicative vehicle fleets and staffing across counties. A third option would preserve counties' independence while using long-term contractual relationships to share services and pursue efficiencies without legislative steps.

The consultants also recommended using a Sequential Intercept Model (SIM) to map services that affect the jail population — from pre-arrest diversion through reentry — to identify service gaps and guide investment decisions. "It's less expensive to keep people out of the jail system if you can," Applebee said, describing SIM as a roadmap for reallocating dollars and targeting new funding.

Mark Esther Brook, who led the facilities assessment, urged commissioners to include jail maintenance and upgrades in the capital improvement plan to avoid emergency operational failures. He also flagged aging jail-management software across the counties and recommended upgrades so officials can pull real-time data for operational and policy committees.

Commissioners pressed for follow-up details: a commissioner asked whether Lincoln and the adjacent counties have similarly aging data systems; the consultants confirmed the problem was regional and offered to respond in writing to a request for two-sentence comparative findings between the facilities. County staff said they will work with the report's authors, Two Bridges Regional Jail and a newly formed steering committee that includes county community members, to develop next steps.

The commission noted the county is currently operating near the state's corrections spending cap and said interim contract extensions with Two Bridges may be needed while the planning process continues. The board approved the SMRT report by voice vote; the motion and second were recorded in the meeting but no roll-call tally was provided on the record.

Next steps discussed included forming operational and policy committees to identify cases that can be moved out of custody sooner, pursuing legislative advocacy for statutory or funding changes when necessary, and convening stakeholders to determine whether to move toward full integration, a regional authority, or a targeted consolidation of services. The commission scheduled follow-up work through the steering committee and staff and will consider contract timing and budget implications as the planning proceeds.