The Work Nobody Sees: My Visit to the Platte County Jail

The Work Nobody Sees: My Visit to the Platte County Jail

This week, I had the opportunity to visit the officers who maintain our public safety at the Platte County Jail. I want to start by acknowledging them for the extraordinary work they do.

One of the tougher jobs in county government

These are professionals who, on a good day, deal with the worst of our societal problems. On a bad day, they can become famous for all the wrong reasons. And still they go in, day in and day out, working to make our county safer and to maintain our detention and criminal justice systems.

Their work is not easy. They work in an underground environment that is not populated with the kind of people you would choose to interact with on a daily basis. The sights, sounds, and smells can be overwhelming at times. And yet they know they have to do their job flawlessly — every shift, every day.

They are working in an environment that is not only dangerous, but also in need of updates and reinvestment by the community. And they do it without complaining. They know that eventually the community will have their back. In the meantime, they make do with what they have, the best they can.

Dignity is a safety strategy

While I was there, the officers talked about more than the daily work of running the detention center. They also spoke about how important it is to maintain programs that keep inmates stable and constructively occupied. Access to Bible study. Access to digital material to help keep minds engaged in a productive manner. A proper facility for exercise, where inmates can move and stretch. Even high school diplomas and continuing education.

Don’t get me wrong. This is not the Taj Mahal, and the inmates are not receiving gold-plated services. But the officers there are intelligent enough to know a simple truth: when you maintain human dignity and keep people mentally occupied, you keep a difficult situation from becoming a worse one.

When the lights go out

What surprised me most was learning that our county generator serving the jail has issues. When that generator goes down, it creates problems for our 911 team — and it plunges the jail into pitch blackness — including the cell blocks themselves.

Think about what that means. Those officers have to go out and secure the cell blocks in total darkness, protecting the inmates from any environmental danger, like a fire. That turns an unsafe situation into a dangerous one.

But they do it anyway. They do it because the job requires it. And they do it because they are determined to operate in a humane way.

A conversation we can’t keep postponing

At some point, as a community, we are going to have to talk about our public safety facilities. I have reviewed a lot of the past history, and there has been a reluctance to address issues that seem to be compounding. I know there has been an ongoing public debate about it. Regardless of where the public lands, it is something we are going to have to address and talk about.

I know a bipartisan commission put forward recommendations four or five years back. Maybe it’s time to dust off those recommendations and re-examine them. That will be a conversation for after the election, for the incoming elected officials.

But no matter what we decide to do or discuss, the men and women of our public safety system working in that jail deserve recognition and credit for what they are doing. They are professionals. I was absolutely impressed with how efficiently they work on behalf of the public — to protect us, to maintain our detention systems, and to be humane caretakers of human beings who ultimately made poor decisions, but who are still human beings