Video visitation services for inmates at the new Greene County jail in Paragould are expected to start this week. Greene County Jail administrator Dave Tierney tells the Associated Press inmates and visitors should be able to talk to each other via video starting September 3. He says the process will eliminate face-to-face visits. The new video calls will be available through appointments and will be recorded. The services are a key feature of the new 75,000 square-foot jail, which opened last month. Nearly 500 inmates can be housed at the new facility. The new jail is possible due to a sales tax increase that was passed by voters in 2012.
Johnathan Reaves is the faculty advisor and editor-in-chief for Delta Digital News Service and the former News Director for KASU Public Radio. As part of an Air Force Family, he moved to Arkansas from Minot, North Dakota in 1986. He was first bitten by the radio bug after he graduated from Gosnell High School in 1992. While working on his undergraduate degree, he worked at KOSE, a small 1,000 watt AM commercial station in Osceola, Arkansas. Upon graduation from Arkansas State University in 1996 with a degree in Radio-Television Broadcast News, he decided that he wanted to stay in radio news. He moved to Stuttgart, Arkansas and worked for East Arkansas Broadcasters as news director and was there for 16 years.