By Jennifer Learn-Andes
The Times Leader, Wilkes-Barre, Pa.
LUZERNE, Pa. — During recent legislative testimony about crime trends, Luzerne County Manager Romilda Crocamo highlighted the aging prison population as a concern that must be addressed.
Older inmates with “escalating chronic health needs” are contributing to rising medical costs and challenging a prison staff “increasingly called upon to manage geriatric and end-of-life care in a setting never designed for it,” she told the Senate Majority Policy Committee and House Republican Policy Committee at a hearing earlier this month in Hazleton .
“Corrections officers are trained for security, not hospice care,” Crocamo told the legislators, emphasizing “graying behind bars” is an emerging issue statewide.
As an example of issues that arise, Crocamo cited a man with dementia incarcerated at the county prison on Water Street in Wilkes-Barre in 2023.
According to her testimony:
Police had responded to the man’s residence on multiple occasions. The man’s wife was unable to care for him at home, and he sometimes left his residence naked due to his dementia. Eventually, police charged him because a child resided in the neighborhood. While incarcerated, he fell and broke his leg. The hospital released him back to the county prison, maintaining it was “a safe place.”
A former state aging department official informed her something must be done about the inmate, but no outside elder care facilities would accept him due to his criminal charges. Crocamo worked with representatives from multiple county offices to downgrade the charges and house the man in a facility equipped to address dementia patients.
Crocamo said it’s common knowledge the county needs a new prison because it is too small and costly to maintain. Constructed in the late 1880s and last renovated in 1987, the structure was not designed with “aging-specific care” in mind to accommodate wheelchairs or other needs of older adults, she said.
“It’s not a safe place for a person who has a broken leg and dementia,” she said.
County correctional services leadership has identified inmate medical needs as “one of the most pressing drivers of the county prison budget” and outside medical treatment as a “major factor behind overtime,” Crocamo told legislators.
The county prison system houses an average of 550 inmates and has been the top departmental expense in the county budget for many years. Total spending is budgeted at $33 million in 2026, an increase of $1.5 million from 2025. This budget covers costs at both the prison and nearby minimum offenders building on Reichard Street .
Statistics
County Correctional Services Division Head Stanley Fiedorczyk affirmed Crocamo’s concerns and released statistics to show the rising number of inmates in older age categories.
To be fair, Fiedorczyk stressed age is not a sole driver of medical and health needs.
The oldest age category is 70-plus.
Seven inmates were in this age bracket for the entire year in both 2010 and 2015, but there were 30 inmates 70 and older last year — three women and 27 men, his statistics show.
Statistics also show an increase in the second highest age grouping of 60 to 69. The total inmate count in that category was 29 in 2010; 71 in 2015; and 125 in 2025.
Overtime is impacted for those with health issues because multiple prison correctional officers must transport and guard each inmate requiring medical treatment the entire time they are outside the prison, Crocamo said. Outside treatment is necessary when the required level of care cannot be provided by the prison’s medical unit.
In 2025, inmates collectively spent 922 days in the hospital, according to WellPath LLC , the county prison system’s inmate medical provider. The total so far this year is 376 days.
County inmates required 281 off-site medical visits in 2025, and there were eight same-day outpatient surgeries, WellPath said. This year to date, the total was 80 off-site appointments and six outpatient surgeries.
At one point last year, three inmates were on dialysis, each requiring three treatment sessions per week, prison officials had said.
The county has a constitutional requirement to provide medical services to all inmates.
The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections is also grappling with health needs associated with the “rapidly aging population” in the state prison system, according to 2025-26 budget testimony.
The county prison system houses inmates both serving sentences and awaiting adjudication. Inmates sentenced to two years are lodged in state prison, officials have said.
Solutions
Crocamo said she is hopeful the county will prioritize planning for a new prison. In a meeting last week, County Council’s Correctional Services Committee outlined goals to start searching for possible sites and designs for a new prison.
The county is pursuing several other measures to address the trend of aging inmates, she said:
—Correctional staff training on handling dementia, mobility limitation and end-of-life care — skills she described as “far removed from traditional security training but increasingly central to the job.”
—Prison release programs tailored to older adults.
—Coordination among corrections, human services and other county departments to address inmate needs as a group.
“We need to understand the population in our prison is aging and brings with it new and challenging obstacles,” she told legislators.
Additional state funding is needed, but Crocamo said she does not believe a county leader should simply “wait for Harrisburg .”
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