By EDWARD HUSAR
Herald-Whig Staff Writer

A small group of Adams County officials has been meeting privately with a consultant in recent months to draft plans to build a county jail in case state or federal grant money becomes available.

County Board Chairman Mike McLaughlin asked the County Board's Finance Committee to set aside $50,000 this year from the county's Contingency Fund to pay Springfield-based consultant Glen Hodgson to update a jail study he conducted several years ago.

The initial jail study was launched in the hope the county might win a $10 million state grant to build a new 208-bed jail, which would have cost about $14 million at the time. However, county officials reported in March 2005 that the money was instead awarded to projects in Moultrie and Winnebago counties.

That caused Adams County's jail proposal to be shelved temporarily, but county officials continued to see a need for a jail to replace the existing 58-year-old facility in the Adams County Courthouse, especially once the federal government started making economic recovery funds available.

"We want to be shovel-ready when some funds become available," he said.

McLaughlin recruited several county officials to take part in a series of private meetings with Hodgson, who has been surveying jail staff and other Courthouse personnel to explore alternatives. They are:

* retrofitting the existing jail;

* building an entirely new jail on the courthouse square;

* or building a new jail at an off-site location in Quincy.

McLaughlin said the periodic meetings have been taking place behind closed doors, because the team has been exploring the possibility of buying property in Quincy's downtown as a potential off-site location.

"What we were trying to do was keep it on the QT so when we started looking at land options," the sale price wouldn't automatically be inflated because a governmental entity was interested, he said.

Now the investigatory team is getting ready to reveal publicly its findings. McLaughlin said a member of the team, County Board member Mark Peter -- chairman of the board's Health and Safety Committee -- will make a report at next Tuesday's County Board meeting.

McLaughlin said Peter has been involved in the meetings with the consultant because his committee has been reviewing deficiencies at the jail cited by inspectors from the Illinois Department of Corrections. Also involved have been Finance Committee Chairman John Johnson; Finance Committee member John Heidbreder, who has been heavily involved in overseeing construction of the new Health Department building; and Sheriff Brent Fischer.

McLaughlin said the team "is not really a committee," since no formal appointment was announced or approved at the County Board level. Nonetheless, he said the team has not been publicly announcing its meetings, which has raised questions over whether these sessions have been subject to the Illinois Open Meetings Act.

"We kept the meetings quiet for the real estate side of it," he said. "That's something we're working on all the time."

McLaughlin said the team is "still considering" sites in the downtown area, but "I don't want to name them."

Heidbreder said he's glad to see the behind-the-scenes work now being brought to the full attention of the County Board.

"It is time to publicly announce this has been going on and tell our fellow board members," he said.

-- ehusar@whig.com/221-3378