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SPOTLIGHT

Trends in Kentucky’s jail population

By Kayla Carter Smith, Policy Analyst
Nearly half of inmates housed in county jails are state or federal inmates.

There are currently 77 county jails in Kentucky: 70 full service, 4 regional and 3 life safety. Kentucky law (KRS 441.025) requires counties to provide for the incarceration of inmates arrested in the county by providing a jail or contracting with another county. Even if a county has a closed jail, the fiscal court still maintains responsibility for the incarceration of those inmates.

For more information on jail classifications, click here.

Full service and regional jails report their jail population to the Kentucky Department of Corrections (DOC) on a weekly basis. These reports can be found here. Note: the three life safety jails are not included in these reports or the statistics below.

From Jan. 1 – Oct. 10, 2024, the average weekly county jail population was 19,815 inmates.

County inmates

All Kentucky jails house county inmates which include those that are newly arrested, those in pretrial detention (including felony arrests) and those serving a sentence for misdemeanor offenses. Counties are fully responsible for the cost to incarcerate those defined as county inmates. 

County inmates make up slightly more than half of the total county jail population in the state. Many of these inmates are pre-trial inmates that will become state inmates if they are convicted and sentenced on a felony offense.

State inmates

KRS 532.100 requires most Class D felony inmates and some Class C felony inmates to serve their sentence in a county jail. State inmates housed in county jails also include controlled intake (inmates awaiting classification by DOC), parole violators and alternative sentencing participants.

Only full service and regional jails can house state inmates, and counties receive a $35.34 per diem reimbursement from the state for the incarceration of these inmates beginning on the day of sentencing. On average, state inmates made up 38.2 percent of the jail population in 2024.

Federal inmates

Some county jails also house federal inmates through contracts with federal agencies and receive a reimbursement rate for incarceration costs based on what was negotiated in the contract. As of Oct.10, 2024, there were 20 counties housing federal inmates ranging from three to 569 inmates. On average, federal inmates made up 9.5 percent of the jail population in 2024.

Trends over time

In 2019, the average Kentucky jail population was 24,820 inmates – an increase of more than 5,000 inmates over 2024.

In March of 2020, the county inmate population drastically decreased as the COVID-19 pandemic began. Many county inmates awaiting trial for non-violent crimes were released to try to stop the spread of COVID-19 in congregate settings. By June of 2020, the county inmate population started to trend back up but has remained steadily below 2019 levels. The average county inmate population was 11,627 in 2019 compared to 10,376 inmates in 2024 – an 11 percent decrease.

The state inmate population in county jails also decreased during the pandemic. The population started trending back upwards in 2022 but has since declined further. In 2019, the average state inmate population was 11,500.

The federal inmate population in county jails did not decrease during the pandemic and is the only inmate population that has increased since 2019. The federal inmate population has increased by 11 percent, from an average of 1,692 inmates in 2019 to 1,877 inmates in 2024.

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