Webster County residents can expect to receive a letter in the mail this week from the Webster County Board of Supervisors to educate voters on the upcoming $45.5 million bond referendum Nov. 7 to build a new jail to replace the existing overcrowded and outdated facility.

The letter highlights the “conservative design with safety and functionality as the core criteria” for the proposed new facility, as well as the taxpayer money that is hemorrhaging out of the county due to the costs of having to house inmates at other jails around central Iowa.

The current jail on the third floor of the Webster County Law Enforcement Center was built in 1983 and has a capacity of 56 inmates. According to Webster County Sheriff Luke Fleener, the county has an average of 75-90 inmates in custody every day. Due to inmate classification rules by the Iowa Department of Corrections, the jail can have fewer than 56 inmates and be considered at capacity as well.

Over the last five years, Webster County has spent roughly $1.4 million to house inmates out of the county. That number includes the daily cost charged per inmate by the hosting jail, as well as transportation costs and salary costs for deputies to transport inmates.

According to Fleener, there are approximately 1,012 individuals waiting to serve time for various offenses, totaling 7,398 days. Inmates serving sentences for convictions are required to pay $100 per day in housing costs. That’s more than three quarters of a million dollars that the Webster County Sheriff’s Office has been unable to collect. Those individuals’ cases also remain open in the courts until their sentences are discharged.

Several existing safety concerns about the current jail’s floor plan also contribute to the need for a new facility, according to the letter. The existing design is a “linear layout,” which has long hallways and acute angles that create blind spots and require closed circuit television to maintain constant visual surveillance of the cells.

The letter not only explains the need for a new jail facility, but also what the impact on the taxpayers of the county will be if the bond referendum is approved by the voters. The tax impact, it says, is spread over 20 years. A house assessed at $100,000 — with a net taxable value of $52,000 — would see a property tax increase of about $62.40 per year.

To give residents the opportunity to ask questions and learn more about the proposal, a series of community information meetings have been scheduled, with the first at 1 p.m. on Sept. 17 at Friendship Haven’s Tompkins Celebration Center. Tours of the existing jail facility will be offered following some of the meetings.

A website to further educate voters will go live this week at www.webstercountyvote.com. Project updates will also be available at the Webster County Vote Facebook page.

Community information meetings

1 p.m. Sept. 17, Friendship Haven Tompkins Celebration Center, 420 Kenyon Road.

6 p.m. Sept. 18, Dayton Community Center, 104 First St. N.W., Dayton

1 p.m. Sept. 19, Gowrie City Community Center, 1206 Market St., Gowrie

1 p.m. Oct. 1, Webster County Fairgrounds Auditorium, 22770 Old Highway 169

6 p.m. Oct. 2, Badger Fire Department, 150 Second St. S.E., Badger

6 p.m. Oct. 3, Otho City Fire Department, 200 Rake St., Otho

5:30 p.m. Oct. 4, Fort Dodge Middle School Auditorium, 800 N. 32nd St.

5:30 p.m. Oct. 18, Fort Dodge Middle School Auditorium, 800 N. 32nd St.

6 p.m. Oct. 19, Clare Community Center, 203 N. Hood St., Clare

1 p.m. Oct. 21, Friendship Haven Tompkins Celebration Center, 420 Kenyon Road.

5:30 p.m. Nov. 2, Fort Dodge Middle School Auditorium, 800 N. 32nd St.

2-4 p.m. Nov. 4, Webster County Jail tours, 702 First Ave. S.

Additional tours of the existing jail will be offered from 2-4 p.m. on Sept. 17, Oct. 1 and Oct. 21.