LANCASTER, Ohio -- Fairfield County commissioners are considering a day-reporting center where nonviolent misdemeanor offenders addicted to drugs or alcohol or who owe back child support could be sent as an alternative to jail.

The analysis is preliminary and officials don't know yet what it would cost, Commissioner Judy Shupe said yesterday.

"It could be very cost-effective if we could utilize an existing building," she said.

The idea is to clear bed space in the county's overcrowded jails in downtown Lancaster.

The main jail on E. Main Street and the misdemeanor jail on W. Wheeling Street are so crowded that the county has spent about $600,000 annually in the past few years to house prisoners at jails in other counties, Sheriff Dave Phalen said.

Judges Patrick Harris and David Trimmer of Fairfield County Municipal Court, who already run a drug court and a mental-health court designed to treat people rather than jail them, are receptive to the day-reporting idea, Phalen said.

Misdemeanor offenders would report for several hours each day and receive drug testing, counseling and other services. Deputies and counselors hired through the county Alcohol, Drug Addiction and Mental Health board likely would staff the center. Offenders could report in during the day or, if they work, could report in the evening, Phalen said. It would not be an overnight, residential center.

County officials recently visited the Lee Day Report Center, a community-based corrections center in West Virginia, to see how the program works.

mlane@dispatch.com