By C1 Staff
MONTEREY COUNTY, Calif. — The county and two companies have agreed to split a funding request to ameliorate health services at the county jail following prison realignment.
The Salinas Californian reports that Monterey County, Behavioral Health, and the Community Corrections Partnership will unequally split the $3.03 million funding request.
About $1.53 million will be used to boost the contract with California Forensic Medical Group and another $1.35 will be used to pay for 10 new corrections officers. Sheriff Scott Miller also asked for another $153,421 to add a transportation deputy.
All three requests are among the “ramifications” of Assembly Bill 109, colloquially known as prison realignment, Miller said. Per the 2011 law, “low-risk” inmates who be committed to state prisons are instead held at county jails.
The jail recently came under fire in a lawsuit that alleged serious medical and mental health deficiencies persisted inside the facility. In addition, the facility and its policies didn’t comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The suit was brought about by the same law firm largely behind wide-sweeping prison reform in California, and was joined by the ACLU and Monterey County Public Defender James Egar.
A year later, about $89 million was allocated for a jail expansion, which Miller said will solve many of the problems listed in the suit.
The additional money now added will allow the jail’s current medical provider to station more medical professionals at the jail.
Miller also hopes to match the new personnel with more deputies, who would help supervise those types of transfers.
In related news, early Tuesday the Board authorized the Monterey County Sheriff’s Office as a representative to sign up eligible inmates for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act.