City Council Responds to Randall County Jail Issue

City Councilman Tom Scherlen/Photo by Campaign

As Randall County Commissioners are turning up the pressure on the City of Amarillo, with threats that Randall County may no longer accept City of Amarillo inmates, members of the Amarillo City Council are now responding.

City Councilman Tom Scherlen reacted to the move by Randall County on Tuesday after Commissioners voted to give the City of Amarillo until May to agree to its terms to continue accepting City prisoners. According to Scherlen, the controversy came out of left field, as the City of Amarillo had already agreed to the terms put forward by Randall County.

“We’re at an impasse,” Scherlen said. “We’re not understanding what is going on with Randall County due to the fact that we were willing to sign a contract giving them everything they were asking for, with the numbers they were giving us. The problem is they wanted us to have a minimum number of inmates.”

Scherlen went on to say that the City of Amarillo believes this move would be unfair to its position.

“That’s the part we sort of don’t agree with because nobody else has to do that,” Scherlen said.

According to Randall County Judge Christy Dyer’s comments during the Commissioners’ Court meeting on Tuesday, the vote taken by the Commission puts the City of Amarillo on notice that the contract will be terminated within 180 days. Dyer said the move follows along with what is outlined in the contract, which allows either party to terminate the agreement with 180 days’ notice.

“Either party can give notice of 180 days, so we are putting them on notice,” Dyer said.

If no deal is reached between the parties, the contract will be terminated within 180 days, which will be in early May 2024.