MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The coalition of counties auditing jail bills spearheaded by Monongalia County suspects mistakes and duplication in what they are calling an “antiquated process.”
Monongalia County Commission President Tom Bloom said each county has paid an outside entity to examine and compare the bills. The mistakes include not properly tracking an inmate after a conviction and transfer from the jail system to the state prison system, multiple counties paying for the same inmate, and the cost of maintaining outdated technology.
“As we went through and each county started to hire individuals to look through the bills, we saw that at times the bills were 10 to 30 percent incorrect,” Bloom said. “This is hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
The coalition contends there are three systems in the state, the Department of Correction and Rehabilitation, circuit courts, and magistrate courts that do not maintain a uniform system to manage the status of inmates. Bloom said counties receive jail bill information via fax machine, and one commission reported 500 pages of jail bill information had been transmitted over a single two-week period. The members of the coalition believe the state should improve the jail and prison inmate tracking system by moving to a computer-based system that can display and manage information in real time.
“There are programs like that, and we don’t understand why we’re using such an antiquated system that is not working; it is very clear,” Bloom said.
According to Bloom, more than 20 counties are behind in making jail payments, and some cannot meet the obligation at all. The coalition counties, he said, make up more than 50 percent of the total jail expenses billed to the counties.
“Any money we find goes back to the county to pay the people we had to hire,” Bloom said. “We shouldn’t be doing this. There needs to be a better system, and we believe we can work with them.”
State lawmakers would need to approve the additional cost to automate the inmate management system, and support from WVDCR commissioner David Kelly would be important. Coalition counties want to press Kelly, and lawmakers need to make the needed changes during the upcoming legislative session.
“We would like to have the process immediately revaluated and get a new computer program to improve accountability and everyone working together,” Bloom said.
For counties like Monongalia, changes adopted in 2023 with HB 3552 jail costs have increased more than 30 percent along with the suspected billing mistakes. The counties would like to see an expedited solution so they can accurately plan for jail costs and manage other financial priorities.
“We want to work with them so we can solve these problems,” Bloom said. “The problems are extremely troubling and severe, and when you consider the amount of money it’s costing us.”