Inmate overload is leaving Carbon County Correctional Facility officials looking for a plan to ensure no prisoner is left without a bed.

The prison's population was at 217 on Wednesday, just shy of its 223 inmate capacity, Warden Timothy Fritz told the Carbon County prison board during its monthly meeting."The numbers have been increasing," Fritz said. "The surge really came out of the blue and I don't think it can be attributed to any one thing other than new charges being filed. The last two to three weeks is when we have really seen the population rise."Wednesday's population is actually down from the 227 prisoners, 50 females and 177 males, housed on Sunday. A few inmate releases since that point have gotten the prison back under capacity.When overcrowding is a short-term problem, as Fritz hopes this situation is, prison officials can add cots to certain cellblocks to accommodate the extra people. If it looks to be a long-term issue, he added, they would look at housing some prisoners in another facility.Expanding Carbon County's house arrest program is one avenue officials are looking at to get heads out of prison beds."The Criminal Justice Advisory Board is looking at adding more ankle bracelets that would allow for home monitoring," Fritz said. "That could be a solution.Only low-risk, nonviolent offenders would be eligible for the house arrest program, as is the case now.In other news, interviews are underway for the county's next deputy warden.The position has been empty since Fritz was promoted to acting warden last November. He lost the "acting" tag in March when the prison board named him warden."We're going to take some time to review the candidates and hopefully have a decision made by next month," Fritz said.Inmates may soon have the opportunity to take part in a pen-pal program courtesy of Blue Mountain Community Church prison ministry.Church officials contacted Fritz and said the program could help inmates who feel alienated and lonely in prison."Sometimes family and friends reject prisoners because of their situation, and this would in essence be Bible study through these letters," Fritz said.There would be no cost to the prison for the program and inmates could choose whether they want to participate.Males would write males and females would write females, Fritz said.The board also announced that a kickoff meeting for a potential re-entry program in Carbon County will take place Sept. 29 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the county's Communications Center.