Kentucky Pushes Back Against Counties
Following moves by the counties to sue the State for jail costs, Kentucky DOC may transfer “up to thousands” of Class C and D inmates into in-home incarceration, using global positioning monitoring devices and saving the state money but costing county jail budgets through loss of revenues.
[T]wo county judge/executives hope to share their concerns … with the General Assembly’s Interim Joint Committee on Judiciary which is also looking at ways for Kentucky to reduce its corrections budget. Campbell County’s Steve Pendery and Larue County’s Tommy Turner will ask to testify before the committee about the impact of moving Class C and D felons from county jails, according to Turner. My jailer came to me (Monday) and said they are taking seven people from our jail,” Turner said Monday afternoon after a meeting of the Criminal Justice Council, charged by Gov. Steve Beshear to look at ways to reduce inmate populations and costs. At around $32.50 a day for each state inmate, Turner said, that’s more than $227 a day and $80,000 a year [in lost revenue]. Last year, the LaRue County Jail ran a $50,000 a month deficit.
Justice and Public Safety Cabinet Secretary J. Michael Brown said there is no specific target for the number of inmates who could be placed in GPS monitoring devices and in-home incarceration. I don’t have a target number in mind,” Brown said. “But I suppose it could be up into the thousands.” Brown was asked how that might affect county budgets. My job for the commonwealth of Kentucky is to find the most efficient way to run the Department of Corrections,” Brown said.
Vince Lang, Executive Director of the County Judge/Executives Association, said counties feel left out of the discussions about how to respond to growing costs and incarceration rates.
“More inclusion of the counties in the discussion about saving money would make us happier,” Lang said.
Plenty more detail at News and Tribune.com
County-State Issues, Early Release, Electronic Monitoring, KY Campbell County, KY Larue County, Kentucky