Funds freed?

By Hannah Wever
Review Staff Writer
Published: March 27, 2008

State government officials changed their minds and reinstated a funding cut for the Central Virginia Regional Jail recently. For the first time since it opened, the counties the jail services: Orange, Madison, Greene, Fluvanna and Louisa, have been obligated to pay a share of the facilities costs.
Until recently, federal and state funding more than covered the county’s share of expenses for housing criminals. Space in the jail occupied by suspects held on federal charges was paid for by the federal government. But now, there are more local and fewer federal offenders, so the counties served by the jail will have to cover their costs.
When county officials presented the 2008-2009 budget to the board of supervisors last month, Orange County’s part of the tab for the jail came to $762,702, a substantial line item on the county’s list of expenses; especially since that’s all new money.
“That’s almost a penny and a half on the tax rate. It’s a significant impact,” Orange County Administrator Bill Rolfe said.
But now, after a change of heart at the state level, Orange County’s financial obligation for the jail has been cut by more than half.
“The amount required for jail funding has been reduced to $308,484,” Orange County Director of Finance Karen Karasinski said.
That’s good news for a county claiming flat revenues and facing multi-million construction projects, imminent closure of some of the counties’ most popular services and budget cuts in nearly every department of government.
But according to Orange County Assistant Administrator Julie Jordan, there’s bad news as well. Any savings the county might realize as a result of reinstated state funding for the jail will show up as reduced funding from the state elsewhere in the budget, Jordan said. So ultimately, “it’s not going to result in another program being saved,” she said.