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| Somerset jail tops county spending |
| By morningsentinel.mainetoday.com |
| Published: 05/28/2009 |
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BY DOUG HARLOW- Staff Writer Kennebec Journal & Morning Sentinel 05/28/2009 SKOWHEGAN -- Somerset County Commissioners, jail administrator David Allen and county administrator Robin Weeks continued final adjustments to the jail operations budget Wednesday for a presentation deadline today to the state Board of Corrections. Using a state-mandated spending cap for 2009-10 of $5.36 million as a guideline, the group whittled down proposed spending to about $5.1 million, not including the projected $2.7 million in debt service on the jail, which opened in October. The Somerset County budget itself for the coming year, not including the jail and the jail debt, stands in at $3.7 million, bringing the total county budget package to about $11.5 million for the coming year including the debt service. "I have to stay within that $5.3 million -- that is our operating budget to include salaries, benefits, all the electrical, all the fuel, basically everything that runs the budget," Allen said. As a cost-cutting measure, Allen said, one of the five pods at the new county jail in East Madison will not be open in this coming year. That will eliminate the cost of five staff positions for about $350,000 in savings, he said. Allen said the county is in a unique situation with the Board of Corrections, in that the facility has not yet been open for a full year. As an example, he said, estimated costs of propane to heat sections of the jail and the garage had to be adjusted upward. Other cost adjustments include a 10 percent rise in the cost of health insurance benefits for employees, even with a 40 or 45 percent employee contribution. There also is a projected 5 percent increase in the cost of contracted medical care for prisoners. "We're still changing the numbers," Allen said. "We have been open only six months, but we can almost forecast where we are going." Video arraignments at the jail have saved money on fuel transporting inmates to court in Skowhegan, Allen said. Salaries at the jail will be frozen after July 1. Weeks, the county administrator, said the original plan when the new jail was approved by voters in 2005 was to offset the cost of operations and debt by charging money to board prisoners from other facilities. But with the consolidation of state and county correctional institutions by the Legislature last year, that hope was removed, she said, putting the burden of running the jail and paying for construction on Somerset County taxpayers. As of July 1, the county no longer be paid to house prisoners from other jails. "Without such revenues," county commissioners wrote in a letter to state officials April 9, 2009, "Somerset County will now be faced with taxing the municipalities in Somerset County for the full debt of the new facility. "That change imposes an enormous and unnecessary burden on the citizens of Somerset County and breaks a promise to voters that jail debt would be partially be paid for through the collection of boarding revenues." Weeks said she hasn't heard back from state officials since. Progress continues with another scheduled session of the Somerset County Budget Committee tonight. New budget drafts show the position of probate clerk, which had been cut in previous drafts, being reinstated for now and the secretary for the district attorney's office reinstated to 32 hours. A county patrol position was cut in the most recent budget draft, as was a maintenance position.Read more. If link has expired, check the website of the article's original news source. |
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