Deal could refund millions
Lawmakers looking at overcharges to counties
Legislators could be close to resolving a decade-long dispute between Florida counties and the Department of Juvenile Justice over who pays to keep juvenile offenders locked up — a fix that could save Orange County taxpayers millions of dollars.
Orange leaders say the current arrangement is unfair and has overcharged the county at least $15 million since 2010.
“We are always in the trap of paying budgeted costs — what [the Department of Juvenile Justice] thinks it will spend — and not what was actually spent,” said George Ralls, deputy Orange County administrator and director of health and public safety.
The county, like dozens of others in Florida, has sued to recoup overcharges or get credits for future billings. Brevard, Lake, Seminole and Osceola counties have had their own disputes with the department.
The disputes are a result of flawed De-
partment of Juvenile Justice rules, which state courts have found to be “not supported by facts or logic,” said Cragin Mosteller, spokeswoman for the Florida Association of Counties.
An appeals court reaffirmed that decision earlier this month. If the appellate panel’s ruling sticks and is enforced, the decision could be worth as much as $200 million to counties that were overcharged.
But Mosteller said the counties would prefer a permanent fix that will provide accurate billings and prevent court fights.
State Sen. Jack Latvala, RClearwater, has proposed a bill that would create a new cost-sharing formula to split detention bills evenly between the department and the counties while also putting an end to the ongoing, taxpayer-funded court squabbles.
Latvala proposes that the counties pay their actual costs from the previous year — not estimated costs for the coming year.
The current arrangement requires counties to pay annual estimated costs in advance for detaining juvenile offenders, a process that often results in overpayments or last-minute, unexpected bills from the Department of Juvenile Justice.
For instance, the department estimated Orange County’s share of detention costs would be $3.5 millon this year, but the county, concerned about a surprise bill at the end of the fiscal year, set aside $4.5 million in July “just to be safe.”
Three months later, the department sent the county an adjusted bill that was even higher at $6 million.
Ralls said that extra money could have been used to address homelessness, indigent health care, or other local priorities.
Because the state wouldn’t give back the county’s $15 million, commissioners briefly considered not paying the bill.
“Holding any money back and telling the state, ‘ Why don’t you take it from the money you owe us’ is probably not an argument we want to have with them,” Orange County Administrator Ajit Lalchandani explained at the time. “It’s a mandated cost.”
Under the disputed costsharing rules, the counties pay 63 percent of detention costs while the state pays the rest.
Latvala’s bill would split the costs 50-50.
State Sen. Joe Negron, a Republican from Stuart and chairman of the Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations Subcommittee, said the counties would have to waive their claims to overbillings for Latvala’s bill to make it through the Senate.
If the bill is adopted as proposed, Orange County estimates it would save about $1.2 million a year.
“At least this would give us some hope that indirectly we’ll recuperate some of that overbilling over time,” Ralls said.
Orange commissioners approved a resolution Feb. 9 unanimously endorsing the measure, though it meant likely abandoning the $15 million claim.
“This is probably as good as we’re going to get,” Commissioner Pete Clarke said.
Brevard and Lake counties, which also were involved in the lawsuits, recently approved similar resolutions backing the bill.
In 2015, Orange County booked 5,668 children into its Juvenile Assessment Center, including 3,235 youths who were accused of committing felony offenses. About 800 of those offenses involved guns, according to county statistics.