The last healthcare provider lost its contract in June 2016 after some of its own staff accused it of improper practices.Ĭhatham County sought a fresh start, signing a multiyear contract worth $7 million annually with a small Atlanta company, CorrectHealth LLC. In the previous 30 months, seven inmates had died at the Chatham County Detention Center, shaking public confidence. The new contract marks an increase over the $6.9 million approved by the county when it first awarded the company the contract in 2016.FILE PHOTO: The Chatham County Jail sits at sunset in Savannah, Georgia, U.S., May 2, 2019. The commission voted 8-1 with Commissioner Chester Ellis dissenting to renew its contract for inmate healthcare with Atlanta-based CorrectHealth at a cost of $7.2 million.A combined enterprise fund budget of $10.4 million, which includes the sewer fund, solid waste management, the county parking garage and building safety and regulatory services.A combined internal service budget of $31.3 million, which includes costs for computer replacement, employee health insurance and risk management.Included in this budget are the inmate welfare fund, the emergency telephone fund and the child support enforcement fund. A combined special revenue budget of $21.4 million.Other funds in the 2018-19 Chatham County budget include: According to the county’s budget workbook, this budget includes $14.1 million for the recently reformed Chatham County Police Department and additional funding for new equipment at public works.Īnother $7.7 million was approved in the county’s non-sales tax capital improvement fund, which will provide for new county vehicles and capital expenses at the jail, sheriff’s department and juvenile court. Meanwhile, in the budget devoted solely to the unincorporated areas, the Special Service District, commissioners on Friday approved a spending plan of $34.1 million. The $85 fee for removal of dry trash, while lower than the $131 one-time fee levied on unincorporated residents last year to aid the county in recouping hurricane cleanup costs, is nearly double the $43 annual fee charged to these residents in years’ past.Įlsewhere in the budget, $192 million was assigned to the countywide general fund, which will encompass the employee pay increases, $4 million for the county’s impending costs for the E-911 department and an increase of $300,000 for a new contract for inmate healthcare and associated monitoring in at the Chatham County jail.Ĭommission Chairman Al Scott reported during the board’s pre-meeting in the Green Room Friday that the county will also set aside $100,000 in the general fund to assist with the creation of a Multi-Agency Resource Center in Chatham County, which is aimed at intervening in the lives of troubled kids and diverting their paths from incarceration. On the heels of recent decisions by the Savannah-Chatham County school board and the Savannah City Council to raise their own property taxes, District 3 resident Jacob Butler thanked the commission Friday for not moving to increase the millage rates it charges to taxpayers. Only one county resident weighed in on the county’s plans for local taxes at the commission’s third and final hearing of its millage rates Friday. The Chatham County Commission on Friday adopted a combined $600 million budget for the upcoming fiscal year that devotes $100,000 to the development of a new resource center for local youth, provides for an increase to a $12 per hour minimum wage for full-time county workers and establishes a $4 million annual for the local Emergency 911 center – all while holding property tax rates steady.Īs approved by the commission this week, millage rates for the upcoming fiscal year will remain the same as they were this year: at 11.543 for the general fund, 4.99 for the special service district and 1.15 for the Chatham Area Transit service district.
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