Construction of a new jail for Russell County was approved at the Monday night meeting of the Russell County Fiscal Court.

All but Magistrate Greg Popplewell voted in favor of the new $3.7 building to be constructed behind the Russell County Senior Citizens' Center in Russell Springs.

This was the second round of bids for the building. In the first round construction costs were bid at more than $2 million more, but changes were made to the plans and the recent bids were in line with the original predictions of construction costs.

County Judge-Executive Mickey Garner said the bond payments on the new jail would be almost exactly the same as the cost the county is presently paying to house prisoners in other counties.

The total budgeted cost of the project was set at $4.544 million.

Another project was approved for the same property.

County Coroner Larry Skaggs had received bids for construction of a multi-purpose building to house a morgue, his office space and parking for the coroner's vehicle. That building was approved by acclaim at the meeting with magistrates saying they'd already approved it, pending the decision to build a jail at a previous meeting.

The court also gave its continued support to a grant powered program to purchas the Shilo Motel building in Russell Springs and convert it to emergency and temporary shelter space.

The federal grant money would go toward that and the purchase of derelict properties that would be torn down to allow Habitat for Humanity to construct new homes.

Garner also told the magistrates that the county used over $20,000 worth of salt on the roads during the recent snows and that more salt has been ordered and delivered.

The transfer of $100,000 from the general fund to the jail fund was approved, as were transfers from the previous year's carry over funds to various county funds that were showing a negative balance.

The court also approved advertising for bids to build a restroom facility and septic system at the site of what had been Alligator 1 Boat Dock. The county is moving toward taking over the lease of that property since the marina relocated to Jabez.