The next few years are likely to be pivotal ones for Warren County Regional Jail, and the two candidates for Warren County Jailer hope to take the helm and guide the jail as potential expansion or new construction is being contemplated.

Current Jailer Stephen Harmon has filed for what would be a third full term if he is re-elected, and for the first time he has an opponent on the ballot.

Javen Roberson, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran and former police officer, said he hopes that the leadership skills he has developed both in the military and with various police agencies will translate to the jail’s top administrative position.

“I want to base my campaign on respect, responsibility and right-minded decision making,” Roberson said.

The two Warren County natives are on the Republican primary ballot, and the winner of the May 19 primary will have no Democratic opposition in the general election.

Harmon was appointed jailer in 2017 and won subsequent elections in 2018 and 2022, having come to the position from a career in the Warren County Sheriff’s Office, where he began as a dispatcher at age 18 and worked his way up to division manager in communications.

Warren County Fiscal Court last year approved a feasibility study to assess structural needs at the jail.

Harmon said he wants to help guide the process, and he hopes an upcoming feasibility study will shed some light on how to address capacity issues and infrastructure at the facility and also project future needs there several years into the future.

“We have very rarely been under the bed count as far as inmate population, and being he fastest growing community in Kentucky we’ve got to address the bedspace issue, and fiscal court and the community are serious about it,” Harmon said.

A committee of local officials will spend the next several months analyzing information gathered through third party studies and weigh options that might include building onto the existing facility or embarking on new construction altogether.

In addition to that priority, Harmon said “a love of service” motivated him to run for re-election, and he points to a number of accomplishments during his tenure at jailer as assets, including establishing an inmate ID program that enables inmates to obtain essential identification documents for successfully reentering society, the first county jail in the state to do so and introducing a re-entry services division with staff members teaching programs designed to prepare inmates for release and reintegration into society.

“We put a real keen focus on making sure that inmates are prepared on release after serving their sentence,” Harmon said. “We have had other counties come here to see what we’re offering to see how they can model their program after things we’ve implemented.”

Roberson served 10 years in the Marines, which included two combat deployments to Iraq and one to Afghanistan, and he attained the rank of sergeant.

He went into civilian police work in 2014, spending time as an officer with agencies in Washington, D.C., Georgia and Colorado before returning to Bowling Green, where he is now a code official with Warren County Public Works.

Roberson said his experiences as a platoon sergeant and as a field training officer with the Georgia State Patrol impressed on him the importance of carrying out his duties with professionalism and leading by example, while also being personable.

“I want to use all the experience I’ve gotten from where I’ve been to give back to the community that raised me,” Roberson said. “I know when it’s time to be hands-on and when it’s time to do administrative stuff … people out in town tell me they need a transparent jailer, and I plan to be as transparent as I can be, I want to be informed every step of the way.”

Roberson said that an expanded or altogether new jail facility to meet the needs of a growing community would require elevated training standards for staff members and more opportunities for inmates to prepare for re-entry into society.

“I have to teach the people in my command that you’ve got to be professional,” Roberson said. “The person in jail, they’re at the lowest point in their life and they need God to help them and they need us to help them and push them the right way, they need help from the community and it’s going to take all of us to help this individual not keep coming back to the jail. I’m willing to work with anybody on any level to help my staff and the people in my care get better and be better people.”

Harmon said that a peer support program he introduced has provided helpful guidance to staff to address their mental health, and he hopes to do more work to reduce potential barriers to re-entry for inmates nearing their release date.

“What I’d like to do this year or early next year is be one of the first jails in the state to have a social worker on staff that works along with a psychiatric nurse in our re-entry services division,” Harmon said.