Will the Petersburg City Jail close as Mayor W. Howard Myers has announced?

Stay tuned.

Mayor Myers is facing a Petersburg City Council revolt over his announcement last week that the jail closing is a done deal and that arrestees would be housed outside the city at Riverside Regional Jail beginning March 1.

Ward 1 Councilwoman Treska Wilson-Smith, an opponent of the closing who supports building a new jail, is leading the revolt.

She is pushing for the governing body to take a fresh look at the jail closing plan.

In a vote that largely went unnoticed last week and has been downplayed by the mayor, Ms. Wilson-Smith secured majority support for her proposal to “revisit” the issue.

The council voted 3-2 last week to hold a meeting with Petersburg Sheriff Vanessa Crawford and then consider whether to move ahead with the closing.

The vote came just a day after Mayor Myers publicly announced a jail closing plan, upsetting his council colleagues who never were notified of his intentions.

Councilman David “Ray” Coleman, Ward 6, who previously opposed the closing, and a newly elected councilman, John. A. Hart Sr., Ward 7, joined Ms. Wilson-Smith in voting to reconsider the issue.

Only Mayor Myers, who represents Ward 5, and the former mayor, Brian A. Moore,Ward 4, opposed the motion.

One council member abstained from voting — Samuel Parham, Ward 3, who defeated the chief advocate for closing the jail, Kenneth Pritchett, in November’s election. While the council has seven seats, one is vacant with the

recent death of Vice Mayor Carl “Mike” Ross.

“We have heard from the (jail closing) proponents, but the council has not heard the sheriff’s side at a public meeting,” Ms. Wilson-Smith said this week. “We need to do that before we go any further.”

While Mayor Myers met privately with the sheriff last Wednesday and claimed that was sufficient, Ms. Wilson-Smith said that meeting did not satisfy the proposal approved by the council.

She said she has requested that the sheriff be invited to the council’s meeting next Tuesday, Feb. 17, to state her case for keeping the jail open.

Ms. Wilson-Smith said she would seek another council vote on the closing proposition if Sheriff Crawford makes an effective argument for it to remain open.

The council voted 4-3 to close the jail on Dec. 9, but did not notify the sheriff.

Since then, Sheriff Crawford has told reporters that Petersburg would not save any money by closing the jail, and that keeping it open would prevent layoffs of more than 60 civilian and sworn personnel.

She also has said the jail’s major problems could be cured by repairing the broken elevator and replacing the air conditioning system, items that the council funded in the city’s current budget.