As Mecklenburg County works to reopen one of its previously closed detention centers later this summer due to overcrowding at the existing jail, the North Carolina Division of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention continues to push for the return of juveniles to the county.
If and when that could happen remains to be seen.
The Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office announced in May that it’s planning to reopen the Mecklenburg County Detention Center North — also known as Jail North — to address the “unprecedented” overcrowding that has taken place at the existing facility, Mecklenburg County Detention Center Central, according to a press release from the sheriff’s office.
Bradley Smith, public information manager for the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office, told Carolina Public Press that while early August was the initial target for reopening, they’ve since had to push it back to September to ensure the facility is “ready to adequately house residents.”
The current plan for the facility is to accommodate the adult resident overflow from Detention Center Central, but there’s been ongoing discussions about the possible inclusion of juveniles.
While the county is trying to remedy the capacity crisis in its own backyard, the state Juvenile Justice division insists that reinstating juvenile beds at the center would have “considerable benefits” for youth.
History of Jail North and juvenile detention
Matthew Debnam, communications officer for the North Carolina Department of Public Safety, said Jail North previously served as a juvenile detention center that had 72 beds total. It closed in May 2022 due to staff shortages at the adult jail.
When Juvenile Justice first learned of the plans for the juvenile detention center to close, it sent a memo to the Mecklenburg County Commissioners asking them to reconsider and offered a series of alternative next steps to avoid closure. Ultimately, in June 2022, the state agency learned that the county would not continue its existing contract for juvenile detention services and the center would be closed, Debnam said.
Juvenile Justice and the sheriff’s office have been discussing the possibility of reopening the facility as early as its initial closure, having had several meetings with them and other officials between then and now, Debnam said.
While the facility has remained closed to residents through the years, Smith said it’s been functioning as part of the office’s training center and has been used for community events.
In October 2025, the sheriff’s office announced that Juvenile Justice had asked them to start recruiting and training the staff needed to reopen the center. The request was met with initial pushback from the sheriff’s office, which claimed reopening efforts would put an “undue strain” on existing recruiting efforts at the sheriff’s office. It also noted the state’s request was not a statutory requirement for the sheriff’s office, according to a statement from the Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office.
To reopen the facility, it would need to recruit and hire almost 100 detention officers and even more support staff, according to the statement.
In May 2026, the sheriff’s office announced it would be reopening Jail North, not for juveniles, but to ease the significant overcrowding at Central.
“To maintain the safety and security of our staff, residents, and the community, we must take immediate action to address the growing population inside Detention Center Central,” Sheriff Gary McFadden said.
“As we move into the summer months — when crime tends to increase — reopening Detention Center North is a necessary step to help manage the overcrowding while we continue working through these ongoing challenges.”
Logistics of reopening
The sheriff’s office announced in May that its goal is to hire up to 50 detention officers for the new facility right away and offer a $7,500 sign-on bonus, according to the press release. Because the sheriff’s office is still figuring out logistics for the facility, how many beds or residents it will accommodate remains unclear. Residents will be moved from Detention Center Central to Jail North once it opens, but exactly how many is yet to be determined, Smith said.
In May, the population at Central was 2,084 inmates, well above its capacity of 1,791. As the population has increased, so has the need for more meals, and more residents are having to sleep on “stack-a-bunks,” Smith said, which are hard, plastic bases with a 3-4 inch mattress on top.
Some 288 inmates were staying in overflow areas and using “stack-a-bunk” sleeping arrangements because space is so limited. Roughly 60 inmates were staying at the facility awaiting a transfer to state prison, and some had to wait as long as almost three months after sentencing before being transferred, according to the May press release.
Most recently, the population at Central was 2,080 inmates, Smith said, a slight decrease from last month. But now, 323 inmates are staying in overflow areas and using stack-a-bunks, while 86 inmates are waiting to be transferred to state prison, Smith said. These numbers have increased from May.
Overcrowding like this can reduce efficiency and increase the risk of incidents, according to a 2025 press release from the sheriff’s office.
While the sheriff’s office is “always willing to discuss the possibility of housing juveniles again” at the facility, its primary focus right now is addressing Detention Center Central’s “rising population” and is only planning for adult residents at Jail North, Smith said.
Jenny Harbin, director of the Children’s Alliance, said discussions regarding the possibility of housing juveniles have hit a wall due to the preexisting staffing concerns.
“The sheriff ran a fantastic juvenile detention center when it was open, and so we want to support him in making sure that if it reopens, it’s as successful as it can be,” Harbin told CPP.
“If he sees staffing as an issue, then certainly we don’t want to move forward with something that could be harmful.”
The sheriff’s office confirmed staffing is indeed still a factor in the decision.
“Opening that facility for juveniles would require MCSO to hire a large number of additional staff to properly run it. As of right now we are focused on the overcrowding at Detention Center Central which is a mandated function of the Sheriff’s Office,” Smith said.
“As always, we will remain open to discussing the possibility of housing juveniles one day, but our primary focus right now is Detention Center Central.”
The Children’s Alliance has been a strong advocate for moving juveniles back to Mecklenburg County, Harbin said, citing reasons of loss of connection with families, services and the cost of transporting them when placed in facilities outside of the county. William Lassiter, deputy secretary for Juvenile Justice, told CPP previously that one of the priorities of the division is to place juveniles in facilities that are close to home to provide them with the best support system possible during rehabilitation.
As of now, most of the Mecklenburg County youth reside in the Cabarrus County facility, which has an intended capacity of 64 residents — even lower than the capacity of Mecklenburg’s juvenile detention center when it was open — and is struggling with overcrowding and staffing issues as well, Harbin said.
When Jail North first closed in 2022, Juvenile Justice was already struggling with its own overcrowding and staffing issues. Efforts have been underway since then to remedy its capacity crisis by opening more facilities in Rockingham, Perquimans and other counties, but reinstating juvenile beds at Jail North would help even more, Debnam said.
“The Jail North facility is well-suited for serving youth from Mecklenburg County, providing dedicated spaces for education, programming and family engagement. An agreement with Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools previously allowed youth at the facility to remain enrolled in their local school system, minimizing interruptions to their educational progress,” Debnam said.
“Research consistently shows that housing youth near their communities leads to better outcomes for both juveniles and families, and Mecklenburg JDC was a prime example of this model.”
When the center closed to juveniles in 2022, many of these benefits were lost, Debnam said.
Larger issue of overcrowding
Overcrowding isn’t an isolated issue in Mecklenburg County. It’s affecting detention centers across the state, both adult and juvenile facilities alike. The Wake County jail was almost 100 inmates over its capacity in April, previously reported by WRAL News.
Sheriff Willie Rowe told CPP that the Wake County Sheriff’s Office is currently working on plans to renovate its detention annex building, which will add hundreds of more beds and improve infrastructure and security measures.
“The mission of the Wake County Sheriff’s Office is to manage our detention facility population while keeping our staff, the community, and those in our care safe and ensuring that we meet, and exceed, state standards,” Rowe said in a statement to CPP. “Those priorities highlight the necessity of the planned renovation of our detention annex building.”
Other jails struggling include the Robeson County jail, which has a capacity of 410 but was housing 501 inmates as of May, reported by The Assembly.
Even in juvenile detention, the division was short 12 beds on average each day last year, with that number increasing during population surges. This continued despite the division opening three more juvenile detention centers within the past couple of years, according to the division’s 2025 annual report.
While officials have attributed the issue to a myriad of factors, a few that keep coming up, one of those being the passage of House Bill 307 in October 2025, also known as Iryna’s Law. Enacted in response to the murder of 23-year-old Iryna Zarutska on the Charlotte light rail, the law came up with a new way to address defendants with mental health concerns, got rid of written promises to appear and overall created stricter pretrial release conditions for those charged with a violent offense.
Right after the law took effect, McFadden acknowledged its “well-intentioned” nature, but criticized the legislation for the lack of additional resources and funding it provided, which wouldn’t help with an expected increase in population, according to the 2025 press release.
“Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) expects a surge in its detention center population due to stricter release policies, affecting individuals with minor charges,” the press release said.
Mental health also plays a role. Defendants who don’t have the mental capacity to move forward in court can stay longer in the detention center, McFadden said in a news briefing from April.
A backlogged system of convicts who have been sentenced for their crimes but are staying at the detention center until they can be transferred to state prison is another factor.
“We can’t even send them to the North Carolina Department of Corrections because they don’t have the space,” McFadden said in the April news briefing.
Eddie Caldwell, executive vice president and general counsel of the North Carolina Sheriffs’ Association, said not all jails are facing overcrowding issues. He told CPP that statements that have been reported by the news media on the causes of overcrowding involve “anecdotal theories.”
“We have not seen any reports about anyone who has done data analysis to document exactly what is causing the overcrowding in any specific jail,” he said.
Instead of Iryna’s Law, Caldwell pointed to a series of other potential causes. These include the backlogs in county jails — also brought up by McFadden — that was 1,382 inmates as of June 23, Caldwell said.
There’s also staffing problems that lead to challenges managing the population, brought on by poor pay and benefits, he said.
Many magistrates are also imposing higher bonds that keep “dangerous criminals” in jail and off the streets because of the public outcry following Zarutska’s murder, Caldwell said.
Juvenile justice has seen “minimal operational impacts” from the new law, Debnam said, though he can’t speak to the effects on adult facilities. Based on the 2025 report, the division points to the increasing lengths of stay for juveniles and “reduced contractual residential options” as the likely causes for its system capacity becoming strained.
As adult and juvenile detention facilities alike across the state are struggling with this issue and working to resolve overcrowding and operational strain in their respective systems, the division remains hopeful that juveniles could one day return to Jail North.
“DJJDP remains a willing partner in reopening juvenile detention beds at Jail North, and recognizes that doing so will require collaboration with the MCSO and Mecklenburg County government to navigate funding, staffing and population management,” Debnam said.
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