Chief Pinkerton reported July 1 on Smith County jail population, inmate classifications and staffing openings during a Commissioners Court briefing.

“Federal inmates, 25. Smith County count, 8 42. Out of county, 12. Total population, 8 54,” Chief Pinkerton reported, listing additional categories such as pretrial misdemeanors, pretrial felons and state-jail felons. He also gave figures for contracts and per-diem revenue and said there were openings and new hires in progress.

During the discussion, Commissioner Moore asked whether the court was seeing fewer arrests for nonpayment of child support. Chief Pinkerton replied that the number had fallen and suggested that prior incarcerations had prompted greater compliance: “they kind of pay the child support now.” A commissioner noted the practical difficulty of paying child support while incarcerated.

Chief Pinkerton also outlined staffing movements: he reported several hires in queue and said two employees were expected to be ready to start in the next week and others were relocating to Tyler and expected to begin in a couple of weeks. The court did not vote on any action during this report; it was received as informational.

The court did not provide a written report or roll-call vote for the population figures during open session. Some numeric figures in the spoken report contain formatting artifacts in the transcript; the article quotes the chief’s reported figures exactly as spoken.