Centre County jail takes in inmates from nearby facility affected by COVID-19
The Centre County Correctional Facility population swelled by at least 10% Saturday following the transfer of inmates from a nearby prison due to the coronavirus.
Thirty-five Huntingdon County Prison inmates were transferred to the CCCF after “individuals at the jail” exhibited symptoms of COVID-19, according to a Huntingdon County press release.
The Huntingdon County commissioner’s office, emergency management agency and sheriff’s office did not respond to multiple requests for comment about who showed symptoms or how COVID-19 may have affected staffing.
The CCCF received a call Saturday from Huntingdon County’s top prison official about an “(emergent) situation” where all inmates needed to be evacuated, CCCF Warden Christopher Schell wrote Monday in an email to the county’s prison board of inspectors.
The state Department of Corrections was ready to transfer inmates as early as 2 p.m. Monday, a department spokesperson said, but Huntingdon County instead opted to work with Centre County.
Huntingdon County needed assistance “immediately,” Schell wrote in an email obtained by the CDT through a right-to-know request.
“We could be in that same situation, and we need to be good neighbors and good partners with the folks that we have long-standing relationships with,” Centre County Commissioner Steve Dershem said Tuesday. “And I think it’s very important that we all work together at all levels of government.”
Thirty-four of the 35 inmates are quarantined in a separate unit of the CCCF, a system that was developed by the spring and includes guidelines about how inmates are received and how their health is monitored.
The inmates are expected to be quarantined for at least three weeks, Centre County Commissioner Mike Pipe said Tuesday. Huntingdon County is set to pay $65 per day per inmate, which could push the cost to nearly $48,000.
The CCCF has worked for months to reduce its population to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. About 50 inmates from Huntingdon County were already at the jail before the transfer.
Pipe expressed confidence that adding 35 new inmates to the jail population would not jeopardize the health of either corrections officers or inmates.
“It was something that we needed to have happen in short order, and the fact that we have helped to reduce our population in being mindful of having a lower population due to a lot of the other things that we’ve been working on, pre-COVID, during COVID, we did have the space available,” Pipe said.
All 35 inmates are expected to be tested as a precaution, Schell wrote. Temperature checks are scheduled to be conducted at least three times per day.
“Looking through a different lens, I feel we just did not assist Huntingdon County ... but also saved lives,” Schell wrote.
