The Bay County Sheriff's Office now has a new duty on its list. After almost 25 years of a privately run jail, the sheriff's office is back in charge.

The official takeover of jail operations from Corrections Corporation of America is happening right now at 6:00.

It's been a been almost five months from the time CCA decided they wouldn't run the jail till the sheriff's office has taken over today, and Sheriff McKeithen says his men and women have been working day and night to be prepared.

On May 13 the county commission got some startling news. In a letter addressed to the Bay County Commission CCA said they were exercising their right to terminate the contract in 150 days.

That left the commission with a decision to make, and on June 17 they chose Sheriff McKeithen to run the jail.

Frank McKeithen said, "It's been a very long road, long haul. These guys have been working 24 hours a day around the clock. It's quite an extensive job to change one business to another business, especially with 250 to 300 employees and 900 to 1,000 residents, so it's been quite an ordeal."

The sheriff's office has had a little over four months to prepare to run the jail.

"We're ready for it and certainly we'll meet some issues and have some human errors, but we'll fix those and get on with business as usual."

Out of 250 employees working for CCA, 190 have been hired to work for the sheriff's office, and McKeithen says they are excited for the new job.

"What we're hearing and seeing is that the morale is high and everybody is ready. Right now is just everybody is ready to go tork and there excited."

Sheriff McKeithen is assuring everyone that the jail will be run like the sheriff's office.

"I think the inmates as well as the public will realize that it's a new facility and someone new is running it. I'm not talking about the other, but we have a mission and a goal, and ours is that we now have a bay county will be running that jail."

The price to operate the jail is a little over $17 million a year. That breaks down to just over $50 per inmate per day. They’re raising/raised flags that show the official change over for the sheriff's office.

Sheriff Frank McKeithen is now officially the chief correctional officer in Bay County after four months of preparations, and McKeithen says his team is ready.