McCracken County Jail receives donated building for inmate training programs

MCCRACKEN COUNTY, Ky. (KBSI) – McCracken County Jail received a donated portable building to use for one of its training programs.

The building is donated by Graceland Portable Buildings.

The electrical and HVAC training programs help inmates who need a second chance in life.

The McCracken County Jail holds around 500 inmates, ranging from a number of accused different crimes.

The inmates with less violent crimes, who need that extra push to make their lives better, can choose from the list of training programs the jail has to offer.

The new portable building will serve inmates who chose to go into the electrical and HVAC training programs. Those include four program of deckhand, electrical, HVAC, and welding. All are designed to help inmates transition back into the workforce whenever they get out of incarceration with an estimate of an 80% success rate for the inmates going through a program and not coming back to jail.

“Getting through COVID and just getting started back up, our goal right now is to get these programs back to where they need to be, pre-COVID. COVID shut us down for a year and a half,” said David Knight, jailor at the McCracken County Jail.

Knight says the next goal is for training programs like carpentry and other ideas that meet the workforce demand.

“Our goal is to have these folks employed when they get out of jail,” he said.

Knight goes on to let others know that some of the inmates are not horrible people, but simply those who have made mistakes and need the tools to be successful in life.