Fisher County Sheriff Randy Ford spoke to commissioners on Monday, touching on several maintenance issues the jail is facing since reopening and requesting the court’s consideration of his proposal to dedicate revenues from housing outside inmates to offsetting maintenance costs.
Ford explained that since reopening in October, the facility has, and continues to face issues regarding plumbing, electrical, and HVAC systems. He said just having someone come out to replace a filter in the air conditioning system is not only a challenge but also expensive. Ford added that bids for repairs to the plumbing systems were roughly $10,000.
Ford informed the court that monthly maintenance bills were anticipated to be higher than typical, as current expenses are more reflective of the repairs being made than regular maintenance operations.
However, Ford said he was looking to outsource the HVAC maintenance, saying that it is worth the expense to assure the system is operating properly. The company would perform regular maintenance including replacing freon, gaskets, filters, etc. on a quarterly basis.
The cost of the service agreement comes in at around $12,000 annually, with Ford pointing out that some of the systems are located some 15 feet above the ground. He also relayed the company’s claim that the county could possibly see a near 50% reduction on its monthly bill. The jail’s monthly electric bill is roughly $3,000.
In response to the court’s questions about where the money was going to come from to cover the unbudgeted expense for the service, Ford proposed diverting the department’s unanticipated revenues to offset the unanticipated expenditures.
In recent weeks, the Fisher County Law Enforcement Center has been housing inmates from Tom Green County. Per the agreement, Fisher County receives $40 per day, per inmate. As of Monday, Fisher County was housing five inmates, and Ford said housing between 10 and 12 would be optimal so far as to not interfere with occupancy for local offenders.
Ford proposed dedicating the revenues received from housing inmates to current and future repair and maintenance costs. While the court was not opposed to the proposition, officials agreed that with the overhead expenses for each inmate, simply multiplying the number of inmates times $40 was not an accurate reflection of the anticipated revenue. The court is expected to have a better estimate of those revenues when it revisits Ford’s proposal in June.