Harlan Kirgan
An agreement to pay $10 a day for ankle bracelets on parish inmates was rejected by the St. Landry Parish Council’s Administrative-Finance Committee.
Councilman Harold Taylor, who is not a member of the committee, urged the agreement be renegotiated with St. Landry Parish Sheriff Bobby Guidroz.
At the March 7 meeting, Taylor said the ankle bracelets used to monitor inmates cost $5 a day for use on adults and juveniles. The agreement called for a $10 a day fee for adults.
“For the life of me I don’t understand why we’ve got to pay $10,” Taylor said.
“My suggestion is that we need to look harder and to a little more negotiating,” he said.
Prisoner costs have carved a stunning hole in the parish government’s budget.
“Somebody has to manage this on a day-to-day basis,” Taylor said.
The parish can manage 244 inmates and anything over that begins to impact other parish operations such as road and bridge maintenance, he said.
The cost of housing 50 prisoners outside the parish is about $400,000 a year, he said.
The 244 inmates costs about $1.2 million a year, he said.