Sides at odds over quality of jail food

It may not be the breakfast of champions, but an inmate's meal at the Spartanburg County jail might seem pretty darn good to the taxpayers who pay the bills.

A typical breakfast at the jail includes turkey ham, scrambled eggs, grits, toast, coffee, orange juice and milk. Country-fried steak, gravy, steamed rice, green beans, bread, tea and peach slices are the typical lunch fare. A fried fish fillet, macaroni and cheese, bun, cookies and tea make up a typical supper.

But 17 inmates signed a complaint about the food Sept. 11.

"We are tired of getting cold food every day and not enough vegetables," the inmates wrote. "We find our bread is stale. We get bologna one or two times a day for meals."

Warden Larry Powers said the meals meet the minimum standards set for local detention centers in South Carolina. They provide inmates with all their nutritional needs and calories, he said.

"I think they eat pretty good. It may not be what they eat at home," Powers said. He paused for minute then continued, "Probably, in a lot of cases, it's better."

The jail spends about 95 cents a meal, cheaper than any private catering company that has submitted proposals," Powers said.

Powers keeps a sharp eye on his food budget. The menus are planned months in advance. Companies submit bids for food each month. Jail employees sometimes buy items such as milk at Sam's Club. Inmates work in the kitchen and distribute the food.

There are few places other than the jail where you can eat for 95 cents, maybe a breakfast biscuit at Hardee's or a cheeseburger at McDonald's. For 99 cents, you could get a chicken sandwich at Checkers. Judging by the complaints, some inmates might prefer that.

The jail doesn't use any pork because too many inmates were asking for substitute meals, claiming they couldn't eat the meat because of religious reasons. So now the jail uses turkey bacon and turkey sausage. "It's a little bit more expensive, but it's healthier and in the long run it saves us time and money because we don't have to make special meals," Powers said.

The jail serves 1,500 meals a day, or 45,000 a month. The annual cost, $540,000, eats up one of the biggest chunks in the budget after employee salaries. "Some people think we treat them too good," Powers said. "But others, like mothers, brothers, or friends, call and complain we don't treat them well enough. You get criticized either way."

The state follows the same guidelines for inmate meals, but serves on a much grander scale. The 20,000 men, women and juveniles in the Department of Corrections' 32 institutions get three meals daily for a total of 60,000 meals served each day. The state spends $1.49 for the three daily meals, said John Barkley , Public Affairs Director for the S.C. Department of Corrections. The state is able to produce such cheap meals because of farms owned by the state and worked by prisoners. In addition to vegetables, the state's farms produce all the milk, beef and pork used for inmate meals.