Adams County is stuck in the middle of a tri-county prison dance.

One step behind Pike County, two steps ahead of Walthall County — it’s up to local residents to decide what they want.

Corrections Corporation of America is ready to build a prison in Mississippi. If they like a site, the only thing that can stop them is a petition with signatures from 20 percent of the population.

If the people say “no,” CCA will go elsewhere.

In Pike County, the needed signatures came. The people will vote on April 17.

An election that will likely cost the county $12,000, could also close the door to potential jobs, Magnolia Mayor Jim Storer said.

“(A prison is) a good thing for the county and for Magnolia,” Storer said. “It will bring in jobs with retirement and health benefits, and it will give people a chance to work at a livable wage with these benefits.”

CCA would likely bring in seasoned staff at first to help train new hires, but in the long run, they would employ locals.

The jobs they would be doing would be different from the stereotypical jailer, too, CCA Vice President for Research, Contracts and Proposals Lucibeth Nave Mayberry

“It’s not the old prison guard mentality,” she said. “These are careers. We hire teachers, doctors, nurses — everything you would need to run a community.”

But in Pike County, the election is the result of citizens worried about dangerous inmates being housed close to town.

“These will be low-to-medium risk federal prisoners,” Storer said. “In fact, the deed that we’re writing will have a clause written in saying that only low-to-medium risk inmates can be housed there.”

Like Natchez’s concerns that a prison would damage tourism, some in Magnolia have worried about the town’s retirement community status, Storer said.

“We already have two prisons in town, and most people don’t even know that they’re there,” he said. “Besides, when the federal prisoners in this facility are released, they won’t be released into the community,” he said.

“They will be shipped back to whatever state facility they originated from. A lot of people have been worried about that.”

But Pike County resident Jimmy McDonald doesn’t see eye-to-eye with Storer. McDonald led the charge behind the petition.

“I got involved because they are going to open this facility 500 yards from my front door,” McDonald said. “They didn’t go out into the county. They wanted to put it right out in a residential area.”

Having inmates for neighbors wasn’t McDonald’s primary concern, however.

“We are opposed to the private prison system as a whole,” he said. “I believe that it fuels and even causes the incarceration of poor people.”

In Walthall County — the latest site CCA has considered — the county must first publish the prison company’s intent to build. That community will then have a chance to pass a petition and force and election.

But, depending on Pike and Adams counties, a decision may already be made by that time.

The Pike County election will come just a week before the petition deadline in Adams County.

Because of the closeness of the two events, Mayberry said CCA will wait until after the Adams County deadline passes before making a decision.

“We’re not going to make a call on it until we hear from Adams County and Pike County,” Mayberry said. “We’re going to look and see what both sites offer.”