Secretary Votaw hoped that at least one of the nine Districts would give the experiment a fair trial. It was evident that existing conditions in the county jails would have to be changed, and the officials ought to be warned that some action must be taken. Was there any better proposition to be considered? Since the Allegheny penal farm already contained five or six hundred acres, and since most of the adjoining counties were already sending many of their prisoners there, paying at rate of 50c. daily per prisoner, he suggested that the District in which this workhouse was situated might readily convert this institution into one of these Industrial Farms. While at this institution to which convicts from Pittsburgh are sent, it seems possible to put ten-day, and even five-day, prisoners to some profitable work, it would be poor economy to transport ten-day prisoners from the more distant counties to said District Farm. Mr. McGarry raised a question as to the disposal of existing jail properties. Secretary Votaw said that they would be still needed for short termers and persons awaiting trial, but that portions of such jail property might be profitably disposed of. Very often the county jail stood on rather valuable real estate which might sometimes be sold for sufficient to meet the county’s quota on the new District Institution. To illustrate that existing prisons must still be used as places of detention, it was shown during the meetings that at the recent visits of Secretary Votaw in his capacity of Official Visitor, one third of the inmates in thirteen of the larger counties were being detained for trial. It is to be hoped that the problem of furnishing employment to the untried prisoners may be found. Mr. Louis Wolf was inclined on first reading of the bill to think that it would prove impracticable.