Marion jail medical costs outpacing budget
JASPER, Tenn. — Several unexpected expenditures have created an overall $150,077 decrease in Marion County’s general fund balance, but $131,000 of that is for county jail inmates’ medical care that’s already exceeded the fiscal year’s budget.
At the March meeting of the Marion County Commission, County Mayor David Jackson said $450,000 was budgeted originally for inmate medical care.
“There’s $7,000 left in the budget in that line item,” he said.
Marion’s fiscal year doesn’t end until June 30.
“It’s sort of [a] tough swallow to have to pay this, but we don’t have no choice,” Jackson told the board. “It’s just tough. You’ve got to understand, by statute we have to have a jail. We have to take care of them [inmates] medically. Once they’re incarcerated in Marion County jail, they’re our responsibility.”
The board voted unanimously to pay the money from the general fund balance.
Jackson said the board’s finance committee voted recently to amend the current budget on a month-to-month basis to cover the added costs.
“We’ve got three months to go,” he said. “The sheriff’s done everything he can. We could do a lot of other things with this money, so we’re hoping to try to do something to get this [cost] down.”
Commissioner Mack Reeves asked if the county had a procedure for checking the health insurance status of inmates.
“The reason I’m asking that is I did some research, and there’s several attorney general’s opinions where we can collect insurance,” he said.
County Attorney Billy Gouger said that’s something he’s been working on with Sheriff Ronnie “Bo” Burnett.
“Also, there is a possibility of some coverage through TennCare if the inmate has been a TennCare enrollee prior to incarceration — some of the medical care, not all of it,” he said.
TennCare is “basically suspended” while enrollees are incarcerated, Gouger said, unless they are hospitalized for at least 24 hours.
“We’ve had a number of inmates in the last fiscal year that have been hospitalized, and whether they have TennCare coverage or not, we’re not sure,” he said. “That information, while they’re incarcerated, we’re not getting any feedback from the state on which inmates actually have coverage.”
He said county officials are going to examine whether Marion can retroactively charge any insurance organizations, including TennCare, for the expenses the county incurred.
“I just feel like we need some kind of procedure to see if they’ve got insurance, because it’s not fair for the taxpayers to foot the bill,” Reeves said.
Burnett said he’s contacted officials at several similarly sized jails, and some of those have lower healthcare costs because they’ve signed on with a company that provides a mobile service for common medical treatments.
One trip to the emergency room costs the county between $7,000 and $8,000, he said.
“I hate to pay all that money out myself,” Burnett said. “I really hate to pay it.”
County leaders are planning to contact the mobile medical service company that Burnett referenced for further details.
Ryan Lewis is based in Marion County. Contact him at ryanlewis34@gmail.com.