Newly released former inmates who don’t have rides from the Portage County Jail will soon be spared from walking along Infirmary Road.
Effective Dec. 23, Emerald Transportation, an arm of Family and Community Services of Portage County, will have shuttles at the jail at 7:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. weekdays. The shuttles will transport newly released detainees to PARTA hubs at University Hospitals in Ravenna or Kent’s Central Gateway Station, at no cost to the riders.
Jail Administrator Bryan Morgenstern said the Portage County Sheriff’s Office is working with the courts and clerks to time prisoners’ release paperwork with the shuttle. Until the sheriff’s office is able to erect a structure similar to a bus stop on Justice Center property, former inmates will be able to wait in the jail lobby after their release. That structure should be in place shortly after the new year, he said.
The change in sheriff’s office policy follows months of discussions involving Ravenna and county officials, who had expressed concerns regarding the safety and welfare of people who were released from the county jail, but who had no rides to get to where they needed to go. More recently, Judge Laurie Pittman had become actively involved out of concern for defendants passing through her courtroom.
Morgenstern credited the new policy to a collaboration involving Portage County Sheriff Bruce Zuchowski, Portage County judges, Family and Community Services Executive Director Mark Frisone, University Hospitals and “several other community stakeholders.”
Since Family and Community Services also focuses on helping former inmates with re-entry into their communities, Frisone said he will have a re-entry specialist on each shuttle. These specialists can provide housing, SNAP, Medicaid, and job training referrals, he said.
PARTA is providing the shuttle drivers with bus schedules and pre-printed bus passes
to give to riders. The drivers will be trained to help the passengers decipher the schedules, Frisone said.
The sheriff’s office reportedly ended its practice of allowing deputies to drive people to a bus stop in front of the county courthouse sometime after the November general election. Lacking resources, some of the former detainees wandered through downtown Ravenna, where Ravenna police picked them up and transported them to destinations both in and out of the county.
The jail is more than two miles from the nearest PARTA bus stop. With no ride even to Ravenna, former inmates have reportedly had to walk along Infirmary Road, a poorly lit, two-lane stretch of blacktop that carries high-speed traffic.
Pittman, a Portage County Common Pleas Court judge who lives on Infirmary Road, said she frequently saw what she believed were newly released former inmates walking on the street’s narrow berm day and night. She spearheaded efforts intended to result in the sheriff’s office changing its policy.
Frisone said the shuttle will not run on holidays because Emerald Transportation does not have staffing on those days, and PARTA runs abbreviated Saturday schedules with no Sunday service at all.
Wendy DiAlesandro is a former Record Publishing Co. reporter and contributing writer for The Portager.