Officials Focus On Jail Costs

{Charleston, West Virginia}…In October, county officials paid more than $397,000 to house inmates at the South Central Regional Jail. The bill was more than $40,000 higher than October of last year. Kanawha County Commission administrative assistant Kim Fleck says the bill has been higher than usual for four straight months. Fontalbert says the jail bill was running a little more than $350,000 a month last year, but has increased to about $400,000 a month, and it costs about $4.3 million a year to house county inmates at South Central. The state Regional Jail Authority has voted to lower the jail per-diem rate from $48.80 a day to $48.25 a day beginning July 1, 2013. The move is expected to save counties more than $500,000 a year.