New Orleans jail to offer limited free phone calls, tablet access for detainees
19th August 2024 · 0 Comments
By Bobbi-Jeanne Misick
Contributing Writer
(Veritenews.org) — During her successful 2021 campaign for Orleans Parish Sheriff, Susan Hutson criticized the high fees – more than 20 cents per minute – that detainees in the city’s jail pay to make phone calls, saying she would work to provide free phone service. Two and a half years into her tenure, she’s come a little closer to meeting that goal.
Beginning in late September the Sheriff’s Office will begin offering 15 free minutes of audio call time per day.
In addition, the Sheriff’s Office expects to receive 1,400 tablet devices for detainees in the city jail next month, an objective that Sheriff Susan Hutson has been working toward since at least last year. And under a deal with a new telecommunications contractor, Smart Communications, each detainee will be allowed one free 20-minute video call per week.
Under the Orleans Justice Center’s previous telecommunications contract, with Securus Technologies, phone calls cost roughly 20 cents per minute, with the Sheriff’s office earning 86 percent of the revenue from the calls. Hutson’s spokesperson Casey McGee said phone fees generated $981,729.31 for the office in 2023.
Call rates will be reduced to 14 cents per minute, six cents of which will go to the Sheriff’s Office, under the new contract with Smart Communications, which was signed on May 31. The other eight cents will go to the company to offset the cost of the tablets, which were given to the Sheriff’s office for no upfront cost.
McGee said Hutson plans to ask the New Orleans City Council for additional funds during upcoming 2025 budget negotiations in order to expand no-charge calls.
“We are hoping that the City Council [will] add additional funding to our budget to allow us to be able to give completely free phone calls,” McGee said. McGee could not immediately say how much the Sheriff’s Office plans to ask the council to provide.
Even though it is offering free call time, Smart Communications could earn significant money through sales of various types of media on the tablets.
Once distributed, jail detainees will be able to access reading materials, reentry and educational programming and make medical appointments for free. But they will have to pay for other things, such as music and movies.
The company did not respond to requests for comment.
McGee said the tablets will be delivered by late September, and the agency plans to distribute them in phases. Each detainee will receive one tablet, with exceptions for those placed in disciplinary or specialty housing units.
Advocates for incarcerated people have linked violence inside jails and prisons to limited access to phones. In a November 2023 budget meeting with the City Council, Hutson cited examples of reduced violence in facilities that provided tablets and free calls to their residents.
“They’ll have a little bit more autonomy,” McGee said. “And this will be a way to also cut down on any issues with violence related to people fighting over phones.”
This article originally published in the August 19, 2024 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
