Jail expected to finish year $550,000 over budget

Whitley County Fiscal Court members want to meet with Jailer Jerry Taylor in a special meeting Monday morning to try and figure out how to avert a projected $550,000 overrun of the jail budget this fiscal year, which ends June 30.
The meeting will also address the jail employing about six people more than the fiscal court voted to allow it to have.
“I just want to sit down with magistrates and go through everything line item by line, and review the whole situation. I think you can tell that we are looking at a situation where we have to gain control over, and bring into hand or we are not going to make it. I can’t go from a $1.6 million budget to a $2 million budget with income going down,” said Whitley County Judge-Executive Mike Patrick.
“The problem is apparent. We have to find out how to get a handle on it if we can. This is something that needs a thoroughness about it, and a review.”
Patrick said that in addition to jail expenses being about $400,000 higher than expected, revenues are being projected short of the budgeted amount as well. The budget calls for the jail to bring in $913,000 in revenue, but projections show it will take in an estimated $763,000 this fiscal year, which ends June 30.
Patrick said Taylor will definitely be invited to Monday’s meeting.
“We had hoped the jailer would have been at the meeting today, but we will send him copies of the information that I have prior to Monday’s meeting,” Patrick said. “I think that by having this special meeting, and by what you all are going to put in the paper tomorrow, he will have adequate notice that this is going to be discussed Monday.”
Fiscal court members have been dealing with revenue shortfalls at the new jail since it opened in August.
During a special meeting in late October with Taylor, fiscal court members discussed what was then a $300,000 revenue shortfall at the jail, which was blamed largely at the time on bills not being sent out to Knox and McCreary counties for the housing of their prisoners.
Patrick said the jail is currently using a new computer program that is assisting in getting bills sent out sooner to other counties, but that there has been $395,000 in bills sent out this fiscal year, which started July 1, and only $274,000 paid so far.
In addition, Patrick said he is not sure that the jail has been billing for all inmates it was housing for out of county prisoners.
Taylor said at the October meeting that he was willing to work with the fiscal court in cutting back expenses in every area but food, saying he wouldn’t “starve” the prisoners to death.
The fiscal court voted at the special October meeting to appoint a committee composed of Patrick, Magistrate Wayne Wilson, a criminal justice consultant, and Chief Deputy Jailer Jerry Allen Taylor to review jail costs, expenses and issues.
Patrick said the committee hasn’t met, and that that measure to address the problem seemed to have fallen through the cracks.
Patrick said that he and Taylor haven’t spoken in some time. He admits that might help the situation along.
“I would say anything would help at this point. I don’t want to rule out anything,” Patrick said.
In December, the fiscal court voted to limit the maximum number of employees at the jail to the equivalent of 32 full-time workers.
Patrick said based on calculations he made from looking at payroll figures for the two-week payroll period, which ended Jan. 22, the jail still has six people too many working.
He said Jim Woodrum, a criminal justice consultant, reached the same conclusion based on separate calculations.
Patrick said just about every option is on the table at Monday’s meeting from cutting back in expenses to reviewing how well other counties are paying Whitley County to house their inmates, and whether those inmates should be sent back to their home county.
“It runs the gambit of possibilities. I don’t think anything is off the table, any suggestions, or anything else at this point and time,” Patrick said.
Would the county consider closing the current jail, and sending county inmates to other counties to be housed?
Patrick he doesn’t think it would be a good idea to close the county’s jail, and have other counties house Whitley County inmates. He didn’t rule the possibility completely out either.
“I don’t think that will in the long run save money, but we definitely have to bring this operation under control where we can afford to operate it. I guess when you get right down to it, if you can’t afford it, the ultimate would be to stop it, but I don’t really think we could afford that either. I would say any option is on the table at this point and time,” Patrick said.
The fiscal court tabled a request to approve the hiring of new deputy jailers during Tuesday’s meeting, and agreed to take up the matter during Monday’s special meeting.
In light of budget shortfalls, the county recently implemented a countywide hiring freeze that prohibits the hiring of new employees except for when they are replacing an existing employee.
The fiscal court did approve the hiring of two new 911 dispatchers Tuesday, who will take the place of two departing workers.
In addition, the fiscal court heard a presentation from Tim McCowan, owner/operator of Emcon Home Guard LLC, a home incarceration monitoring company.
McCowan asked magistrates to consider a contract with his company to monitor prisoners judged to be indigent and in need of expensive medical care with the county picking up the tab.
He said Laurel, Knox and other counties already have similar contracts, which can save the county thousands of dollars in medical expenses for sick prisoners.
If the prisoner is in county custody and needing an expensive medical procedure, McCowan said the county would have to pay for it, but if the same person were out on home incarceration and indigent, then Medicare would pick-up the tab.
He said one county recently saved thousands of dollars by letting two pregnant women be placed on home incarceration, who were in jail for drug problems.
McCowan said his company’s system uses an ankle monitoring bracelet and a GPS system, which alerts them if a prisoner strays outside their home or work.
District Judge Cathy Prewitt told magistrates Tuesday that her court has been using the home incarceration system for some time with a good success rate. Currently, people being placed on home incarceration are paying the $10 a day fee for it themselves.
“I do support it. It works,” she told magistrates.
Prewitt said a good standard to use for determining if someone is indigent, or can’t afford to pay, is if they qualify to have a public defender represent them. This means they own no land, and make less than $1,000 a month.
Patrick asked McCowan to provide the county with a copy of the contract prior to Monday’s meeting.
County Attorney Paul Winchester noted the plan isn’t for everyone, and that the best thing to do would be to have the jail compile a list of prisoners that would qualify for the program.