Exclusive: 41 Action News tours Jackson County Detention Center

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — On Wednesday, the day before recently lost its insurance.

Under the old contract, the city paid the jail $54 per inmate per day. The county will receive $110 per inmate per day plus medical expenses., under the terms of the new contract.

KCMO Mayor Quinton Lucas said he has “confidence in where our KCPD inmates will be that it is a place that is safe, that it is clean, that it is humane and, frankly, it is the sort of thing that will be drastically different than what we saw as a public safety threat both at the Heartland facility and the Jackson County jail years before."

The long-term recommendation remains for a new jail to be built, but for now the new agreement allows for up to 45 inmates to be housed at the county detention center beginning Thursday.

The agreement runs through March 2020 with the option to extend the contract, if needed.

”At the end of the day, it's that Heartland was not answer,” Lucas said. “It was not the right answer a year ago, it's not the right answer today and I am glad we are moving on beyond that facility. I think, frankly, we have a good agreement with the Jackson County Sheriff.”