Curry County jail bans visitors

CLOVIS — Visitors will not be allowed in the Curry County jail, effective immediately.

“We take our responsibility to protect staff, detainees, very seriously, and are taking actions based on our desire to prevent them from being in harms’ way as a result of COVID-19,” Curry County Detention Center Administrator Mark Gallegos said in a news release on Sunday.

“Anytime we make these types of changes and enhancements to detention operations, we are acutely aware of the impact it has on those who work and live in our detention center as well as their loved ones, and we do our best to lessen the impact as much as possible.”

While visitors are banned, Gallegos said he is looking at options for “conducting and expanding the amount of phone time allowed in order to assist detainees in staying connected to those they care about.”

He said visits with attorneys would still be allowed, but those will be non-contact visits.

In addition to the no-visitor policy, Gallegos announced the following additional changes:

• Suspend all-volunteer services at the facilities. CCADC will be looking at other recreation options to fill in gaps created by this temporary loss of volunteers.

• All public tours and family reunification events will be postponed.

• All staff will be limiting any inter-facility travel unless absolutely necessary and will be conducting inter-facility meetings via phone or web conference whenever possible.

The release said jail officials will review the policies “regularly over the next 30 days.”

Also from Gallegos’ news release:

“As a result to maintain good housekeeping standards, the Curry County Adult and Juvenile Detention Center staff will continue to clean and sanitize all detainee living areas as well as work stations for our employees. Lastly, we will continue to educate both staff and detainees on the COVID- 19 Virus on all precautionary measures as new information has been obtained.”