Accountability: Commissioner Zoller leads move to shut Klickitat County Jail

Sometimes, we work and we work and we work, and we don't get the results we aim for, and the cause of justice and human dignity suffers. We tell ourselves that our activism still matters, that, as President Obama likes to say, citing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."

But sometimes we get to witness our activism making a difference in the here-and-now.

If you haven't heard already, by a 2-1 vote on Friday afternoon, March 29, the Klickitat County Commissioners decided to shut down the Klickitat County Jail. The county will enter an agreement for its inmates to be housed at the Northern Oregon Regional Correctional Facility (NORCOR) in The Dalles, Oregon.The target date for this transition is April 12.

You can read a more thorough report of the meeting and the decision in this article from the Goldendale Sentinel.

In making a motion to shut down the jail, Commissioner Lori Zoller noted, "The public has repeatedly expressed their concerns over the sheriff’s inability to provide a humane and safe environment for inmates." That "public" includes many among the KCDP who attended and spoke out at BOCC meetings, who wrote letters, and who made their moral indignation clear. Eighty-three individuals logged into the Zoom link for this meeting. About 20 were physically present, including individuals who drove from the west side of the county.

It's appropriate to express appreciation to Commissioner Zoller for spending substantial time behind the scenes to pave the way for this change. She led this initiative in the face of stiff opposition from the sheriff and his many defenders. It's easy to write her a note of appreciation--here's the link to her BOCC email address. Voting with her was Commissioner Jacob Anderson. Voting against the proposal was, unsurprisingly, Dan Christopher.

So ends, we hope, the deplorable neglect that came to characterize the treatment of our county's most vulnerable inmates. It is not with a sense of triumph that we detail this change, for this should not be seen as a partisan contest. It's about the dignity and decency that human beings deserve.

But in a larger context, human dignity is a principle that binds us as a party. Decent wages for labor, equitability, healthcare, the right of women to control their reproductive decisions, doing the work and making the sacrifices to bequeath a livable planet to future generations--these are only a few of the causes we fight for. Our reaction and our activism regarding the jail fits within our larger mission, and for this outcome, we are allowed a moment of satisfaction.

And then it will be time to move on to other causes. We've got a moral arc to help bend.