The gray monolithic block building of the Hall of Justice at 850 Bryant St. is one part police headquarters, one part courthouse and one part jail, among other things.
That jail – which houses the most violent of the county’s inmates in a confining series of hallways and cell blocks redolent of county jails everywhere – sits in contrast to the county’s newest modern jail in San Bruno.
Numerous changes are underway at 850 Bryant – including the fall relocation of police headquarters to Mission Bay – and in the not to distant future the building will most notably no longer hold prisoners.
In 2017 the county plans to build a brand new, $290 million jail adjacent to the Hall of Justice.
Much of the debate over the new building has been over how many beds it will have and hence how many prisoners, but some have also questioned the very need for a jail as The City’s inmate population continues to decline because of alternatives to incarceration.
That debate erupted again last week after the Office of the Controller
