Sheriff receives state grant for jail

TIFFIN — The Seneca County Sheriff's Office recently received over $124,000 in funds from Gov. Mike DeWine's Construction and Renovation project at local jails program for security enhancements at the Seneca County Jail. A release about the grant program states "the goal of the program is to help local communities fund improvements at functionally obsolete and structurally failing jails." The release states the program will award $50 million in grants to support renovation projects at 19 jails across the state. When asked about the grant, Seneca County Sheriff Fred Stevens said he was excited to be receiving the funding to support ongoing maintenance and upkeep of the Seneca County Jail. Stevens also reported that when the grant was first available in 2021, the sheriff's office asked for "everything under the sun," totaling roughly $4.3 million. "We didn't get it," he said. In the second year, he pared the ask down to $3 million, but didn't receive anything then. In the third year, he requested $2 million and didn't get it either. This year, the fourth year the grant has been available, Stevens made a list of all the maintenance projects left to complete at the jail. "So I said, 'what can we submit that's under a million dollars that it's maybe something feasible that they will look at?'" Stevens said. When asked about what exactly the money would be going towards, Stevens said he couldn't be specific due to security reasons, but the grant would be used to make various security enhancements. "There's some security issues that are 30-years-old and a lot has changed in over three decades of security," he said. Though receiving $124,781 from the state to make these improvements is cause for celebration, Stevens said he would be reapplying for the grant in future years to continue making improvements to the county jail, enhancing the safety and security of the Seneca County community as a whole.