Rally calls for LA County Men's Central Jail to close 6 years after supervisors' vote passed
LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Protesters rallied outside the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors' Office on Monday, calling for the Men's Central Jail to be shut down.
Six years ago, the supervisors voted to close the jail -- which has been notorious for unsanitary conditions, overcrowding and in-custody deaths.
However, the closure process has been slow and marked by numerous setbacks.
"Folks are still dying in the jail. I just want to say that, my family, we miss John terribly. John been gone for 17 years," said Helen Jones, whose son, John Horton, died under extremely troubling circumstances while in custody in 2009.
The county ended up paying the family a settlement in a wrongful death lawsuit.
After the 2020 vote, the Board of Supervisors put together a Jail Closure Implementation Team (JCIT).
According to the L.A. County chief executive officer's website, the team's mission is to safely and methodically depopulate and eventually close Men's Central Jail. It is guided by the "Care First, Jail Last" vision.
While the website lists "progress to date," including creating the JCIT in 2021 and creating a preliminary set of strategies for mitigating overcrowding, there have been no new entries in the progress section since August 2022.
"On March 30, 2021, this county produced a report, and that was the Men's Central Jail Closure Report, and that report said, 'We know how to close this jail in 18 to 24 months.' Now, has this County Board of Supervisors done so? No," an advocate said at Monday's rally. "What they have done is give billions of dollars to a sheriff's department and a probations department that tortures people, abuses children, and that is why we saw a $4 billion settlement leave this county, the largest in L.A. County history, to pay for that 'care.'"
"No more. We said 'care first,' and millions of voters voted for it with Measure J. Millions of people here in L.A. County said, 'We want our tax dollars to actually address these issues,'" the advocate continued. "Treatment is more effective, more efficient and cheaper, and actually keeps us safe. Instead, we have a system that makes us less safe and kills more and more people who are not well."
SEE ALSO: California AG Rob Bonta files lawsuit over 'inhumane conditions' at LA County jails
Meanwhile, an advocacy group filed a lawsuit on Monday seeking a judicial declaration that voters' approval of a Los Angeles County charter overhaul measure in 2024 did not inadvertently repeal a previous ballot item that required the county to annually set aside money for jail-diversion and other social service programs.
The Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit by Californians United for a Responsible Budget seeks a judicial review and declaration that Measure J -- approved by voters in November 2020 -- remains in effect and enforceable, despite the 2024 approval of the Measure G charter-reform package.
Measure J requires the county to set aside 10% of its locally generated, unrestricted money and spend it on jail-diversion programs and other social services aimed at preventing people from landing behind bars. The funds were intended to be used on programs such as job training, business development, housing services and youth development.
But last year, county officials discovered that the measure was never codified in the county charter after it was approved by voters. That gave rise to concerns that when county voters in 2024 approved Measure G, which updated the charter to overhaul county government with changes including an expanded Board of Supervisors and an elected CEO, Measure J was inadvertently repealed.
County officials said last year that without some type of administrative action, Measure J will go away at the end of 2028.
The Board of Supervisors last year directed its staff to explore ways of correcting the administrative error.
But the lawsuit filed Monday by CURB contends that since Measure J wasn't codified until after the passage of Measure G, the newer measure could not have repealed the previous one.
"A charter amendment that had not yet been filed with the Secretary of State was not part of the charter, and a measure that was not part of the charter cannot have been repealed," attorney Dale Larson said in a statement. "California law does not permit a voter-approved reform of this magnitude to be erased by a clerical error, and we are simply asking the court to confirm what the law already makes plain."
City News Service contributed to this report.
