88 Mahoning sheriff’s workers sent layoff notices
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
YOUNGSTOWN
Layoffs in the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Department are now a reality.
Layoff notices were mailed Friday to 86 deputies and two civilian employees, Sheriff Randall Wellington said.
The layoffs, brought on by the county’s recession-induced financial crisis, take effect June 6, in conjunction with the closing of half the county’s main jail. The layoffs will reduce the number of employees in the sheriff’s office from 299 to 211, the sheriff said.
The county’s minimum-security jail closed as an overnight facility Tuesday, the day after the expiration of the three-year consent decree, which required the county jail facilities be fully open and staffed. That ruling settled a federal class-action lawsuit by inmates concerning jail crowding.
The number of layoffs has been reduced from the 101 planned in March because some deputies quit and took other jobs, the sheriff said.
The sheriff spent $17.3 million last year, but his 2010 budget is $11.8 million.
The U.S. Marshals Service, Bureau of Prisons and Immigration and Customs Enforcement were asked earlier this week to remove 47 remaining federal inmates from the jail by June 6, said Maj. James Lewandowski, jail warden.
In the past, federal and city inmates were a major source of jail revenue — $4.31 million in 2008 and $2.96 million last year.
But fees from those inmates likely will total less than $1 million this year, county officials said. The city paid the county for some of its prisoners under an agreement city officials said they couldn’t afford to renew after its February expiration.
City Law Director Iris Torres Guglucello and Judge Elizabeth Kobly of Youngstown Municipal Court have threatened legal action against the county if city prisoners are released from the jail in violation of city judges’ orders.