With tight quarters at the Pennington County Jail, local leaders are pushing once again for new space at the facility. This comes in tandem with efforts by legislators to build a new state penitentiary.
Local leaders stop short of describing the facility as “overcrowded” but instead say the jail is operating “at or above” capacity.
That motivates Sheriff Brian Mueller’s push for expansion.
“We presented two options," Mueller said. "Option one would be to add two housing floors and then a utility floor at a cost of about $90-$100 million. Option two was to finish those two floors and then shell two additional floors above that at an additional cost of about $12 million to shell those floors in.”
This comes amid challenges at the current facility troubling both staff and inmates, including full beds, sewage issues, and problems with the HVAC unit.
“About $30 million worth of infrastructure updates in the main jail need to happen, Pennington County has that money on hand right now,” Mueller said.
The question then turns to how to best manage inmates during that construction process.
The Sheriff said he believes he has buy-in from city leaders, though taxpayers are also a part of the conversation.
“The Pennington County Commission is working hard on the 2026 budget right now, and their intention is to try and cut some money out and save the taxpayer some money so it's not all on top of the already high property taxes we’re all paying," Mueller said. "This project is not going to get less expensive. I understand the property tax implications; I work hard to be a good steward of taxpayer dollars.”
A proposed jail annex has been taken off the table, and Mueller said expansion of the current facility is the most likely path forward.
Additional information about the status of the jail can be found here.