Acadia Parish prison

New jail, sheriff's offices likely to open in November

By Karla Wall

Though delayed a month by Hurricane Rita, work is now underway on the Acadia Parish Prision facility in Crowley, and is expected to be completed by November.

Lewing Construction of Crowley began work on the new 4-acre complex in October. The facility will include a 23,000-sq.-ft. jail unit and a 17,000-sq.-ft. administration building that will house a training room, break room and office space for the Acadia Parish Sheriff's Dept. It will also include recreation and mechanical yards.

Lewing removed 300 cu. yds. of topsoil for the two buildings, said project manager Joel Hebert. Roughly 500 cu. yds. of compact clay fill was added for the bedding, supplied by LaCroix Trucking Inc. of Rayne. The foundation for the jail unit consists of 700 cu. yds. of concrete.

Lewing is using 3,000-psi concrete for below-grade footing and 4,000-psi for the slab-on-grade, Hebert said.

The exterior of the 12-ft.-high jail unit will consist of a pre-engineered metal structure overlayed with about 9 ft. of CMU supplied by Southern Louisiana Masonry of Baton Rouge. The remaining 3 ft. will be metal sidewall and will be installed by J. Reed Erectors of Baton Rouge. The interior of the jail will be formed with 8-in. solid fill CMU blocks.

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The jail has been designed with central control and management in mind, said designer Mark LaLande of Mark LaLande Architects, Lafayette. Six 20-man dormitories and five four-man dormitories will surround a control room through which guards will operate all locks, plumbing and low-voltage electrical wiring using touchscreen access and camera surveillance.

"We focused on managing the facility with maximum efficiency using minimum staff," Lalande said.

The facility will also house a women's dorm, a medical isolation dorm and a visitation room. The jail will be equipped with cameras and computer technology that will allow teleconferencing of arraignments, making prisoner trips to the courtroom unneccessary. Arraignments will be held via wide-area-network links between the courthouse and jail.

Plumbing has been roughed in for the jail unit, said David Moulis with Moulis Plumbing Inc. of Lafayette. About 4,000 ft. of pipe was used for the sewer systems, Moulis added. Pipe measuring 6-in.-diameter is being placed for the building sewer and 8-in. piping for the sanitary sewer will be routed from an existing manhole to two new manholes.

The 100 to 150 plumbing fixtures in the jail facility will be stainless steel and tamper-proof.

"They'll be difficult to damage and difficult to make malfunction," Hebert said. "If someone tries to flush something down one of the toilets like a shirt or a towel a fence valve stops it in the line before it gets into the sewer system."

Hebert added fixtures are well-concealed, with mechanical and electrical piping, wiring and devices located in a chase area behind each fixture.

The administration building will consist of CMU, metal and brick veneer. The structure will be framed by 2-by-4 and 2-by-6 metal studs supplied and erected by J. Reed. Flooring will consist of commercial tile, carpeting in the office areas and ceramic tile.

Hebert and LaLonde said the major challenge in the project has been the weather. In addition to the hurricane delay, frequent rain has made construction work difficult.

In December, the project was about a week behind schedule.

"It's rained at least a couple of days a week and we're trying desperately right now just to get the foundation poured," Hebert said.