Mayor remains firm: No jail bailout

By DAVID SKOLNICK

skolnick@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

The city will do “everything in our power to work with” Mahoning County to keep the jail open, but don’t count on Youngstown providing a financial bailout, its mayor says.

The city doesn’t have the money to match previous payments it gave the county to house Youngstown misdemeanor inmates, Mayor Jay Williams said Thursday.

“That’s a position that has not changed,” he said. “Our financial condition has not changed since we started these discussions.”

Is there a solution?

“At this point, I don’t know,” Williams said.

The city is facing a $2.5 million deficit in its general fund and looking for ways to cut expenses.

A three-year deal with the city expired Feb. 28.

That deal had the city pay $80 a day for each misdemeanor prisoner jailed at the county jail beyond its 71st inmate. The city agreed to pay the additional fee to help the county settle a lawsuit won by jail inmates over inadequate staffing and overcrowding.

The city spent $654,078 on prisoner fees last year and $1,120,237 in 2008.

Just to get to a $2.5 million deficit, the city eliminated the fees, beginning March 1, to house prisoners at the county jail.

“We’re in financial straits,” said Councilman Jamael Tito Brown, D-3rd, chairman of the legislative body’s finance committee. “Right now, we don’t have the ability to pay.”

The county also is facing financial problems with Sheriff Randall A. Wellington’s announcing last week that he plans to lay off one-third of his staff, 101 employees, and close half the jail by March 28.

Layoffs and cutbacks can’t occur without the approval of a three-federal-judge panel that oversees the jail.

The sheriff’s department is facing a cut of between $4 million and $5.7 million.

County and city officials met for four hours Wednesday behind closed doors with U.S. District Court Judge Dan Aaron Polster, who is attempting to facilitate some sort of agreement between the two parties.

The two sides have until March 26 to meet and attempt to work out an agreement, Williams said.

The city and county are to return for a second mediation session with the judge March 29 if a settlement isn’t reached.