Bob Anez, a spokesman for the Montana Department of Corrections, said officials decided not to appeal Helena District Judge Jeffrey Sherlock's June 6 decision allowing the never-opened Two Rivers Detention Center to take out-of-state felons.
“The state does not intend to impede the efforts by (Two Rivers) to find offenders,” he said.
“We're extremely pleased,” he said.
Smith said the decision removes uncertainty about the jail as developers move forward with attracting inmates.
“It just makes it easier to focus a little more,” he said.
The jail is unique.
The 464-bed prison was built by the cities of Hardin and Lodge Grass, which have no police departments and no inmates of their own. It will be run by Community Education Centers Inc., a for-profit corporation based in New Jersey.
Backers for the jail said they built it as a way to bring up to 100 jobs to the economically depressed area and did so with an understanding from state and local federal officials that once the jail was built, it would be filled with Montana inmates.
However, the Department of Corrections, along with the U.S. Marshal Service in Montana have said they have no need for the bed space. The jail has never opened and the city last month defaulted on the $27 million in revenue bonds sold to build the jail.
Looking for felons to fill the jail, and allow it to open, Hardin officials began looking to other states for convicts. Becky Convery, the Hardin city attorney, asked Montana Attorney General Mike McGrath if the jail could legally house such criminals. McGrath concluded late last year such a thing is illegal.
Hardin appealed that decision to Sherlock.
Lynn Solomon, a spokeswoman for the Montana Department of Justice, declined to comment on Friday's announcement.
Anez did not offer any details on the reasoning behind the decision not to appeal.
Although it is larger than the Montana Women's Prison in Billings, the lockdown was built under the laws governing county jails and is legally considered a jail, not a prison. It is the largest jail in the state.
Out-of-state inmates, while small in number, are already housed in Montana.
Montana's only private prison in Shelby houses some out-of-state inmates, although it was built primarily to house Montana inmates overflowing form the state penitentiary in Deer Lodge. At least one other county jail, Sanders County, also houses a small number of out-of-state felons from Idaho, across the border.
Lawyers for the jail argued in court that Two Rivers was not seeking to do anything not already happening in other Montana jails.
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