COEUR D'ALENE -- In North Idaho voters are being asked to expand the Kootenai County jail for the third time. Whether it passes or fails county officials say there’s no choice: Taxpayers will have to help foot the bill.

“Some people have come in just adamantly opposed, we can't afford anymore taxes, and when they leave they say what can we do to help,” Kootenai County Commissioner Todd Tondee said.

Voters in Kootenai County are being asked to vote yes on two measures that will help expand the current 325-person jail facility, where overcrowding has become a real problem.

“People think when they vote no they're not going to spend the money. We're going to spend the money, we have to spend the money, so how do you want to spend it," Commissioner Tondee said.

The first measure asks voters if bonds should be issued to pay for the $57 Million price tag to be repaid over 10 years. For the first measure to pass, voters would also have to vote yes to a second measure raising the sales tax by a half cent for 10 years to 6.5-percent.

“If it doesn't pass we'll continue to ship people out of county, paying somebody else to watch our prisoners and not spending the money here locally, to help stimulate the economy and help put people to work,” Major Ben Wolfinger with the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Department said.

Last year Kootenai County spent $1.2 Million to house 30 to 50 inmates at other facilities. The county projects that in 2020 that number is expected to skyrocket to 400 inmates each year. It'll start costing the county big bucks.

“The inmates are going to come with our population growth we're expecting in the next 10 years $52 Million to transport and house inmates,” Tondee said.

Two previous attempts to improve the jail have been rejected by voters in the past but county officials and the sheriff's department maintain jail overcrowding is putting lives in danger.

“The real problem is more violent people in custody. Today between 70 and 75-percent of our people in custody are felons, compared to 15 years ago when they were just misdemeanors," Major Wolfinger said.

If the jail expansion is rejected, county officials say the money will most likely have to come from increased property taxes.

“The vote is tomorrow and what it comes down to, is what's the will of the people,” Wolfinger said.