By Libby Addison, contributor
Four years after a Valley-wide debate over expanding the Middle River Regional Jail, officials say the facility, as it is, can handle the number of inmates assigned to it.
Col. Eric Young, the jail’s superintendent, said there isn’t a need for a jail expansion because the jail’s population has decreased since 2021. The jail has enough space and adequate programs to serve the needs of those incarcerated, he said in an interview with The Citizen after the jail board’s quarterly meeting last week.
Middle River Regional Jail, a correctional facility that opened in 2006, is located next to the Augusta County Government Center and is owned by five localities: Rockingham County, Augusta County, Harrisonburg, Staunton and Waynesboro.
In 2021, when Young’s predecessor, Jeffery Newton, pushed for expanding the jail, not all the local governments agreed to the plan. At that time, jail officials warned the population of inmates was threatening to reach the jail’s capacity of more than 900 people.
As of May 27, the total inmate population was 601, comprising 493 men and 108 women, said Lt. Colonel Tony Heflin, the jail’s deputy superintendent, at the June 3 board meeting. There have been recent fluctuations — 558 in March to 603 in April — but the current population is lower than the 740 inmates in May 2024.
Versions of expansion proposals circulated between 2019 and 2021 called for adding hundreds of beds and making other facility upgrades costing tens of millions of dollars, which the five localities would have to share. A proposal in 2021, for instance, was estimated to cost around $39.5 million — which would have cost Harrisonburg $1.2 million more each than what it already spends on the jail. (The 2026 budget that starts July 1 includes $1.9 million for the city’s share of the jail operations.)
Jail officials backed off the expansion plan in spring 2021 after members of the Harrisonburg and Waynesboro city councils expressed concern about the expansion’s cost and whether incarceration was the best criminal justice approach. At least four of the five localities would have had to vote in support of the expansion for it to proceed.
Harrisonburg Mayor Deanna Reed opposed expanding four years ago and still shares the same sentiment today.
“My concern is that jail expansion often creates an incentive to fill the additional beds, rather than address the root causes of incarceration. Data consistently show that this dynamic disproportionately affects people of color,” Reed said.
Reed said moving forward with the expansion without “first exhausting community-based alternatives — like diversion programs, mental health treatment, and bail reform — risks reinforcing systemic inequities.”
“My position is rooted in a commitment to both fiscal responsibility and racial justice,” she said in an email response to The Citizen’s questions.
Reed said Harrisonburg city officials remain “actively involved in the oversight of MRRJ.” In fact, Harrisonburg City Manager Ande Banks presided over the June 3 jail authority board meeting as the chair. That regular quarterly meeting covered finances, mental health and other operational aspects.
Still, Reed said there’s more work to do.
“While there have been some efforts to explore alternatives, they haven’t received the level of investment or urgency they deserve,” Reed said about the jail’s various rehabilitation programs. She said she believes “there’s more work to do to fully develop and prioritize diversion programs, mental health care, and bail reform as meaningful solutions.”
Young said since the COVID-19 pandemic, changes to Virginia’s criminal justice approach — including the state Department of Corrections releasing some inmates — and changes in legislation lessened the pressure on many local and regional jails.
It “opened up more beds in local and regional jails, which makes a big change,” he said.
Young has been with MRRJ since the beginning. In April 2006, he became one of its original administrative members. Since then, he has served in multiple leadership roles with the jail, eventually becoming superintendent in July 2022.
The authority board also outlined in its meeting the steps it has taken to ensure inmates are benefiting from its services. Young emphasized that MRRJ’s “job is to make sure that [inmates are] safe and secure while they’re in a facility somewhere.”
He said jail officials seek to improve programs for inmates, including transitioning back into the community.
“I always say we’re a stabilization unit. We take a person from the worst and try to get them stabilized so they can go back out in the community as a better person,” Young added.
ICE wants jail to hold people released from detention for 48 hours
Also at last week’s meeting, Young told the board that the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) unexpectedly categorized the jail as a “limited cooperation institution” because the federal agency wants jails to keep someone released to be held for another 48 hours.
Young said historically, the jail’s practice has been to hold inmates for 24 hours after receiving an ICE notification for detainer release.
“We’ve never had an issue with ICE any time we’ve had an inmate that has a detainer or an ICE issue,” Young said.
Young told the board he contacted the Western Virginia ICE Immigration Supervisor and determined that the jail needed to hold people detained by ICE officers for 48 hours.
Young said that he sent a letter stating that MRRJ would “abide by this notification,” because he wanted documentation from DHS or ICE that “we have complied with this [requirement that] they’re saying we have not complied with.”
“I will say that I never received a notification from anyone,” Young added.
Jail gets renewal of mental health grant
As the fiscal year nears its close on June 30, Phillip Braverman, director of finance at MRRJ, said the jail’s budget report shows that “revenues are on target to meet or exceed expenditures,” and said salaries, wages and fringe benefits are expected to be below budget.
“We’ve done a really good job of staffing our nursing department to where we’ll be going to full staff,” Braverman said, adding that most of MRRJ’s current vacancies are concentrated at the officer level.
Braverman also said a key mental health grant received renewal for the next fiscal year, which begins July 1. The Criminal Justice Services Board approved the renewal grant for $285,000 — the same funding amount as the Fiscal Year 2025.
“What this grant does is it funds two full-time mental health support specialists…a case manager…a part-time psychiatrist, and one contract licensed professional counselor,” Braverman said.
The Mental Health Department Update, prepared by Corban Smith, mental health manager, highlighted MRRJ’s efforts to expand services for inmates and move away from its previous contract with Valley CSB in July 2023. MRRJ is staffing a psychiatrist, a mental health manager, three mental health clinicians, two mental health support specialists, a clinical supervisor, and a mental health intern, according to the update.
“The total number of documented interactions from the staff members through April was 434,” added Heflin, the deputy superintendent. “During April, 99% of new arrests that were referred by our intake staff, they’re seeing in 72 hours.”
Inmates who exhibit self-harming statements or behavior are placed on suicide precautions and are assessed by a clinician, according to the update.
Heflin also described how clinicians provide guidance on Emergency Custody Order (ECO) petitions for inmates soon to be released who might be a danger to themselves or others. In April 2025, “we had three inmates that were assessed and determined not to meet the criteria, and we had one that was found to meet the criteria.”
“Being fully staffed allows us to get to them a lot quicker,” he added.
One-time “therapeutic crisis sessions” are also offered to inmates experiencing “high-impact life events” such as loss, divorce, or a longer sentencing than they expected. Inmates are allowed up to six sessions.
Through the MRRJ’s Mental Health Request System, inmates can securely communicate their mental health needs and expect a response back from a medical professional the same day. In April 2025 alone, the Mental Health Department received 456 requests.
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