PARIS — Since Gov. John Baldacci’s administration moved to consolidate jails in 2008, Oxford County Jail administrators have periodically crunched numbers to determine if switching back to holding prisoners for extended periods — instead of 72 hours, at most — makes sense.

Jail Administrator Dana Dillingham said the prospect is looking more realistic.

“Four years ago, we worked out a projected budget what it would cost,” he said. “We were doing due diligence every so often to see what it would be. This isn’t out of the norm. It’s something we look at continuously.”

Inmates who must be held for more than 72 hours are boarded at Two Bridges Regional Jail in Wiscasset, about an 80-minute drive and a $700,000 annual expense.

Dillingham said bringing inmates closer would have clear benefits.

At a March 7 meeting of the Oxford County Commissioners, Dillingham said the jail budget stood at almost $2.6 million. An estimate provided to commissioners indicated if the jail held prisoners for longer terms, as it used to, the cost would be almost $2.7 million.

The difference to return to a full-service jail, Dillingham said, “is an amount we can justify to bring the inmates back.

“It’s better for the court system, it’s better for the local attorneys, it’s better for the inmates’ families and it’s more money that stays here in Oxford County,” he said.

Oxford County Sheriff Christopher Wainwright agrees the change would have economic benefits.

“Instead of us boarding out to other counties and paying boarding fees and travel expenses, the money would be spent here in Oxford County,” he said. “We’d have good-paying jobs and less vehicles out on the roads doing transport. We’d also have services available to the community.”

Wainwright said inmates previously did community projects, such as mowing grass in the unorganized territories and helping local towns with cleanup projects.

“There’s a lot of skilled, talented people that sometimes make mistakes,” he said. “Sometimes they need some guidance to get back out there. We were providing — to the schools, towns and community centers — a good workforce.

“We had a good workforce here, and we had a good workforce on the grounds of the county. People mowing cemeteries in the unorganized townships, shoveling, plowing, handyman work. All those things it’s hard to put a dollar amount on.”

But hurdles need to be cleared before the jail can be restored to full service.

Dillingham said the biggest barrier is uncertainty about long-term funding.

“My biggest factor with going back to full service is how are we going to pay for it,” he said.

Proposed legislation — LD 973, “An Act To Stabilize County Corrections” — has been tabled in Augusta, according to Cumberland County Sheriff Kevin J. Joyce.

During a March 25 public hearing on the bill, Joyce said prior to 2008-09, “the counties were able to fully fund their jails through the taxes assessed to their county property taxpayers.”

“Once the Board of Corrections was created,” Joyce said, “the property taxpayers from each county did not have to contribute to the funding of our jails beyond the established tax cap set for each county in 2009.

“Due to the unfulfilled jail funding commitment made by the state when the Board of Corrections was created, and lack of adequate funding for the years of the Board of Corrections existence, a structural gap was created between what the state distributed to counties and what was allowed by the tax cap when the Board of Corrections was repealed.”

Joyce wrote in a Maine Voices Column, published May 8, 2018,  in the Portland Press Herald, that the Board of Corrections in 2015 was repealed and the complete operation of each jail was given back to the counties.

A new law provided legislative funding for the jails and the authority to lift the original cap. Sheriffs could request a 3 percent increase in county tax expenditures on jails, which was increased to 4 percent in 2016, according to Joyce.

But for fiscal 2019, the funding was flat and the 128th Legislature ended its session without approving $17.2 million for county jails.

“If you think about any other government entity, if the state budget was capped, from 2008 to never be raised, where would we be in 2019?” Dillingham said.

“Gov. Mills is proposing an 8 percent increase in the state budget. I don’t want to beat up school districts, but what would a school district do if their budget was capped for a year or two or three?

“Corrections is no different,” he said. “There’s a cost of doing business if you want to lock people up, and there are people that need to be locked up. You have to pay the bill.”

Without tax-cap relief or money coming from the state, funding for jails remains tentative, he said.

“Our hands were tied by the Legislature and remain tied until we can make some changes,” Dillingham said. “We need our tax cap lifted.”

jbolduc@sunjournal.com

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