Six of nine central Illinois county jails fail to meet state standards for a respiratory illness isolation cell, state records show. 

A review of 2023 inspection reports for Illinois county jails found Champaign, Dewitt, Ford, Grundy, Iroquois and Shelby counties failed to meet the standard on their individual inspections. There are 92 county jails across Illinois. 

But with renovations nearly complete at the Satellite Jail located in Urbana, Champaign County Sheriff Dustin Heuerman said there will be two isolation cells in the new part of the consolidated facility.

The standards reviewed during inspections are part of regulations that govern county jails, including expectations for safety, security and sanitation. The standards are created by the Jail and Detention Standards Unit within the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC). The inspections, conducted by the unit’s jail inspectors, are completed annually at various times throughout the year. 

The results of these inspections show most county jails in central Illinois failed to meet the standard for a “TB isolation room.” Despite being named for tuberculosis specifically, these rooms can serve as a first line of defense against the spread of any sort of respiratory illness, including COVID-19.

Ed Yohnka, director of communications and public policy for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Illinois, said that while TB isolation rooms are a good start, they might not be enough to fix larger structural issues that cause the spread of disease in jails. 

“The kinds of cells that you’re talking about, or these policies, are good, but they’re really a Band-aid on a larger problem,” Yohnka said. 

He said due to keeping many people in close quarters, prisons and jails are often unsanitary. 

“There’s often a lot of moisture and not adequate heating or air conditioning. The sanitary conditions around the restrooms are often not up to standard,” Yohnka said. “You just have a breeding ground for the kinds of diseases that affect people’s respiratory systems.”

Sheriff Heuerman said the jail has always screened for illness, but relies on someone feeling ill to self-report symptoms and potential exposure.

“We do screening at intake, to include taking the temperature of inmates and screening for other symptoms of viruses. We always have,” Heuerman said in an email. “A big part of prevention, as in any congregate facility, relies on self-reporting by an inmate when they are sick or had a possible exposure to a virus.”

In its first chapter, Title 20 of the administration code outlines definitions and procedures for the Department of Corrections. In Section 701.90, the document details the expectations for a tuberculosis isolation room, which includes guidelines on airflow. 

An isolation room is a cell intended to be utilized when there is a suspicion someone in jail is sick with tuberculosis or respiratory illness. This purpose is to prevent the illness from spreading, per the code. 

Yet many central Illinois jails still fail to meet the state’s standard for having one of these rooms. 

All standards are marked with X’s in either a ”Yes,” “N/A,” or “No” column of checkboxes. For every jail, the “TB isolation room” was one of the only standards that fell into the “No” column. 

Only LaSalle, Livingston and McLean counties successfully met the standard within central Illinois. 

Eight of the nine county jails contacted did not respond to requests for comment or could not be reached.

Pattern unchanged since pre-pandemic

Many county jails lacked the same standard before the COVID-19 pandemic. A previous review by CU-CitizenAccess found inspections showed 65% of Illinois county jails statewide failed to meet the standard during the early days of the pandemic. 

This was despite several outbreaks in jails across the state, specifically in Cook County, which at one point was the nation’s largest-known source of infections. Several outbreaks were reported outside of Cook County as well, though downstate jails came under less scrutiny.

Now, four years after the start of the pandemic, several jails in Illinois still lack adequate isolation cells for inmates with any sort of respiratory illness, COVID-19 included. 

County jails are distinct from prisons in that people who are booked are usually awaiting trial or sentencing or are serving a short-term sentence. Typically, jails are overseen by local governments, while prisons are run by state or federal authorities. 

The COVID-19 pandemic brought on several changes in policy, including masking and quarantine policies during public health emergencies. Following the end of the emergency declaration on May 11, 2023, however, Yohnka said the crisis might have revealed the cracks in the foundation that make policies like isolation rooms minor solutions to a much larger issue. 

“It certainly taught us that our current structure, the architecture for carceral institutions, does not facilitate health in the wake of communicable diseases,” Yohnka said. “I think that it just underscores, in many ways, the need to kind of rethink the whole structure of those facilities.”

Renovation plans for the Champaign County jail have been underway since 2022, when the downtown jail was shut down in favor of renovations for the satellite jail in Urbana. 

The jail closed in July of 2022 after 15 years of discussion. In 2021, Sherriff Dustin Heuerman secured funding from the Champaign County Board to relocate people being detained from the downtown jail to the satellite jail, enabling the closure of the former. 

When rising crime rates prevented that relocation, funding was again secured in June of the following year to relocate people to different county jails, due in part to the satellite jail’s occupation size. The cost of boarding in other counties, including Kankakee and Macon, was in the millions. 

Finally, on July 11, 2022, the city council approved plans for improvements to the satellite jail. The expansion was projected to cost around $20 million dollars. Plans included a new medical wing, as well as several single cells for those who can’t be housed with roommates.

Renovations are expected to be complete this year.

View Champaign County’s 2023 jail inspection report here: